Expert panel on stents rules against differential pricing

NEW DELHI: THE MAXIMUM RETAIL PRICE OF BARE METAL STENTS AND DRUG ELUTING STENTS FELL FROM ₹45,000 AND ₹1.21 LAKH, TO ₹7,623 AND ₹31,080, RESPECTIVELY, AFTER THE RECOMMENDATION BY THE NPPA

Global stent makers’ attempt to skirt price caps in India by introducing advanced stents in a new category has failed, with a government committee deciding against creating such a category.

A year ago, the government capped the price of stents—a mesh tube placed in arteries to improve blood flow—by up to 85%. Since then, many global stent makers withdrew their high-end devices from India, and have been pressing to create a new category of stents with advanced features.

An eight-member government sub-committee of experts that met on January 25 and considered stent makers’ arguments said there were “no grounds” to create a new category. The firms did not “present adequate clinical evidence of superiority in terms of safety and benefit of their stents over currently available DES (drug eluting stents),” it said in a report. Mint has reviewed the report.

“The sub-committee noted that though the companies have claimed that their newer generation stents have incremental innovations in technology in terms of design, polymer coating and drug, they could not produce enough data for superiority in terms of safety and efficacy. The superiority in terms of safety and benefits of a newer stent of a company over the other currently available DES has not yet estab- lished through adequate clinical data. Hence, for the purpose of NLEM, (National List of Essential Medicines) the subcommittee reiterated its earlier categorization of coronary stents as bare metal stents (BMS) and DES,” the report said.

Following last year’s price cap recommended by India’s drug pricing watchdog National Pharmaceuticals Pricing Authority (NPPA), maximum retail price of bare metal stents and drug eluting stents fell from ₹45,000 and ₹1.21 lakh, to ₹7,623 and ₹31,080, respectively.

The sub-committee took up the matter after the NPPA apprised the health ministry of representations it received from firms to include ‘new generation’ of stents with added features as a category within the DES category.

Among stent makers and importers who made representations before the committee on 25 January are Boston Scientific India Pvt. Ltd, Abbott Healthcare Pvt. Ltd, India Medtronic Pvt. Ltd, Meril Life Sciences Pvt. Ltd.