Important to ensure medicines, medical products produced in India are of highest quality: Mandaviya

Union health minister Mansukh Mandaviya on Monday said that it is of vital importance to ensure that medicines and medical products produced in India are of the highest quality for both domestic and export markets.

“Within the Federal Democratic structure of the country, both the Centre and States are required to work together in harmony and synergy to ensure that we establish robust regulatory systems”, said Mandaviya at the concluding session of the of the two-day brainstorming conclave on “Drugs: Quality Regulations & Enforcement”, here today.

Mandaviya further highlighted that the deep dive sessions of the Chintan Shivir provided a platform to all stakeholders to deliberate on different aspects of building a robust, resilient, transparent, accountable and citizen-friendly drugs regulatory framework. This framework will ensure not only quality, but easy availability and accessibility across the country of the highest quality of drugs and medical devises, he added.

“The intense deliberations during the two days provided an opportunity to all the participants to work in a team spirit to deliberate on the building blocks of such a forward looking inclusive, holistic and comprehensive regulatory framework that would set the vision and meet the requirements of the next 25 years on the three levels of policy, priorities and implementation”, he highlighted.

Enthusing the participants, Mandaviya stated that “Our vision is to be known as the world’s most respected and recognised drugs regulator. This can only happen when we move from generic to quality-generic drugs and medical devices production in the country. Our drugs regulatory systems ought to meet the needs to R&D, innovation, organisation strengthening and capacity enhancement”, he stressed, adding that “Quality by design” should be the motto.

Mandaviya was joined by Dr Bharati Pravin Pawar, MoS for Health, Bhagwanth Khuba, MoS for Chemical and Fertilisers, Dr VK Paul, Member (Health), NITI Aayog, T Harish Rao, Health Minister, Telangana and others.

The discussions highlighted how to make the country’s drugs regulatory systems transparent, predictable and verifiable through principles of uniform standards, sturdy structures for compliance and enforcement, and capacity enhancement. Shifting from minimal to optimal standards with provision of periodic reviews, global benchmarking for not only drugs but medical devises formed integral part of the session today. Several participants underlined the importance of creating citizen facing measures to strengthen confidence on the quality of drugs along with portals for grievances, effective recall measures etc.