NEW DELHI: The Department of Pharmaceuticals has proposed that domestically sourced components have to contribute to 25-50% of the cost of medical devices procured by the government, depending on the category of the device. Local content should contribute to 25% of the cost of medical electronics, hospital equipment, surgical instruments and diagnostic reagents/in-vitro diagnostics, according to it.DoP has prescribed the requirements based on its current understanding of the medical devices market in India, according to the draft. "Unlike several other sectors, medical devices are comprised of thousands of very varied products that significantly differ from each other in engineering and design complexity," said the Medical Technology Association of India , another lobby group representing several multinational medical device firms. Some of these segments are far from having an environment to manufacture them locally, it added. Chinese medical devices bag over 20% of the public health tenders in India currently, he added.“We can match prices of any country other than China, as it has no global market economies but a subsidized state sponsored ecosystem.

Source: Economic Times March 19, 2018 18:00 UTC