Union Minister Gowda lauds contribution of Indian pharma industry amid COVID-19 crisis

Stressing on the need of development of indigenous capacity in Medical devices Gowda said, "it is very important as it has a crucial role to play in improving accessibility and affordability of healthcare especially with respect to the availability of precision devices for screening and diagnosis, advanced surgical equipment needed for treatment, and devices for monitoring of health indicators, among others."

He further said under the leadership of Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi, the Department of Pharmaceuticals has taken several measures to create an enabling environment for the development of domestic capacity in the pharma and medical device sector and has decided to support the development of three bulk drug parks and four medical devices parks across the country in coordination with State Governments and private sector. The objective is to make India self-reliant in the production of 53 critical APIs or Key Starting Materials (KSMs), and in the production of medical devices, for which India is crucially dependent upon imports.

Gowda said that he is very much sure that these parks will be able to attract significant investment as well as the latest technology. Within a period of 2 -3 years, due to business-friendly policies of the Union Government under the leadership of Shri Narendra Modi, the pharma sector will become atmanirbhar, not only in sense of meeting domestic requirements but also for fulfilling global demand of low cost - high-quality medicines and medical devices. It is expected that these schemes of the Union Government for the development of bulk drug & medical device park will attract cumulative investment of Rs 78000 crore and can generate about 2.5 lakh employment.