‘File fresh affidavit on COVID drugs’

Prices of life-saving drugs should be brought down, says High Court

The Telangana High Court on Wednesday directed National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA) Director to file a fresh affidavit, observing that an earlier one filed by the authority in response to its direction in a batch of PIL pleas connected to COVID-19 was “ambiguous and lacked clarity”. A bench of Chief Justice Hima Kohli and Justice B. Vijaysen Reddy said it was unfortunate that NPPA had failed to comply with the HC’s direction over Coronavirus-related matters. “Central government would not be permitted to play with lives of people who are running from pillar to post to secure life-saving drugs meant for treating Coronavirus-affected patients,” the CJ observed. While people were finding it difficult to secure such life-saving drugs at reasonable prices, the Central government failed to include these medicines under National Life Saving Drugs list, the bench noted. On May 17, the bench instructed NPPA to include life-saving drugs prescribed for treating COVID-19 patients in the National List of Essential Medicines to bring down their prices within reach of all people. After perusing the affidavit filed by the authority on Wednesday, the bench expressed dissatisfaction stating that it was not clear what steps were taken to include COVID-19 drugs in essential medicines list. The bench instructed the authority to file a fresh affidavit by June 23.