India
is one of the few Third World countries to have an "intermediate"
pharmaceutical industry,
which researches, produces, formulates drugs as well
as sells them. That includes a good HIV test kit--the ones we
imported were a waste of hard currency.
Yes,
we do make copy-cat drugs; we spend a great deal of time, energy and
research to make the drugs a different way. We develop a different
process. Then we make the drugs under tight quality controls, and sell
them here and in other Third World countries. We charge a fraction of
what the First World drug companies charge.
Our
"process
patent" laws have made our growth possible.
Compare Pakistan and India--Pakistan had the strong patents desired by
the US, and has no pharmaceutical industry to speak of.
Pakistan imports expensive drugs made elsewhere.
Meanwhile, with our process patents, we have had substantial growth and
investment within India.
The
decision to expand FDI (Foreign Direct Investment) in pharmaceuticals to 100%
took us by surprise.
Our fear is that rich Western pharmaceutical houses will buy up
Indian pharmaceuticals, eliminate our generic products, end our
research and development programs, and turn us into marketing organizations
for expensive imported drugs.
We
see that already:
the American firm Eli Lilly has just converted India's Ranbaxy from
a 50/50 joint venture to a 100% wholly owned subsidiary.
Eli Lilly has said Ranbaxy will now function as a
marketing arm, although there are talks that it
may run second-phase test trials.
They will continue to make some of the antibiotics like Distaclor and
Keflex, under contract with Ranbaxy and Halol (Gujarat) MJPL.
Other research and production will close down.
Both
Eli Lilly and Pfizer tried to set up wholly-owned subsidiaries with absolutely
no research or manufacturing in the country.
The government turned Pfizer down;
the agreement with Lilly shows our fears are well grounded.
It
is imperative that the government change the policy back and limit the
penetration of Western firms into our country.
