New Delhi (NVI): Amid rising concerns over shortages of medication in India due to coronavirus outbreak in China, the pharma industry has assured the government that they have enough drugs and medicines to deal with any contingency arising out of the impact of the virus.
In the fifth Task Force meeting on API (Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients) held here yesterday, several important issues were discussed regarding policy relaxations to small, medium, and large API units, and also simplification of the process for environment clearance for production and availability of medicines.
The Government of India has constituted a Task Force on Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients (APIs) under the chairmanship of, MoS Mansukh Mandaviya to formulate a road map for the enhanced production of APIs in the country, the Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilizers said in a statement yesterday.
The 5th meeting of the Task Force was called by the Ministry where Mansukh Mandaviya took stock of the situation of availability of drugs and medicines.
The Industry representatives explained thoroughly to Mansukh Mandaviya that they have enough drugs and medicines to deal with any contingency arising out of impact of CoronaVirus. They ensured that there will be no shortage of any Drugs, APIs and Medicines in the coming days in India.
In the meeting, the challenges faced by the Pharmaceutical Industry in obtaining Environment Clearance were also discussed. The delegate of Ministry of Environment and Forest, Climate Change (MoEF&CC) has expressed that steps are being taken to expedite Environment Clearances and furthermore referenced that recently MoEF&CC has modified the guidelines so that there is no need to obtain separate Environment Clearance if the production of the Pharma unit is expanded by half.
