Jahanvi Agarwal
In the most recent development, as per the parliamentary notice passed on Thursday, India’s lawmakers will approve a new drugs bill next week that specifies the legislation for importing, manufacturing, and selling medications. This follows a deadly cough syrup tragedy that the country experienced.
When cough syrups were manufactured, there were linked to at least 89 child mortality in the Gambia and Uzbekistan last year, India’s status as the “pharmacy of the world” suffered.
The law is intended to ensure “quality, safety, efficacy, performance, and clinical trial of new drugs… with the objective of highest possible regulatory standards and a transparent regulatory regime,” according to the parliamentary notice.
The new Drugs, Medical Equipment, and Cosmetics Bill, 2023 has been changed which wasn’t immediately noticeable, but if it is approved by parliament when it returns from break on 20 July, it would replace Old Drugs law.
One of the greatest pharmaceutical industries in the world, India’s $41 billion industry has long provided less expensive alternatives to Western pharmaceuticals, particularly to underdeveloped and handicapped countries.
The image of the sector has been tarnished, however, by recent cough syrup-related deaths and at least one other incidence in which an eye drop produced in India was connected to three fatalities in the United States.
India has imposed mandatory testing for shipments of cough medicine since last month. Companies that produce the syrups linked to deaths in Uzbekistan and the Gambia have denied any connection.