Health Ministry seeks increased budget allocation to regularise medical devices sector.

With the industry keenly waiting for more sops to the growing medical devices industry in the budget, the Union health ministry has sought increased allocation from the Finance Minister to put in place required manpower and infrastructure as proposed by the pending bill in this regard.

Sources said the Ministry has forwarded its proposals to be included in the Union Budget based on the inputs from the industry. Apart from additional manpower, the Ministry has also suggested setting up of a few medical devices testing laboratories at a cost of Rs.40 crore each. “We are expecting increased allocation in the budget to strengthen the regulatory framework for the medical devices sector,” a senior official disclosed.

Ministry is learnt to have forwarded to the Finance Ministry the demands of the industry to exempt life-saving medical devices and consumables used with devices in special life-saving treatment procedures from the customs duty.

Patient monitoring systems & image guidance systems, pacemakers, image guided system, external defibrillators, ENT surgery products, deep brain stimulation implants, drug pumps, heart lung machines, heart valves, respirators and masks and dialysis equipments have been included among the life-saving devices seeking customs duty exemption, sources said.

Custom duty waiver has also been sought for radiopharmaceuticals used in diagnostics like Imaging and Scanning (PET-& SPECT) & Therapy as many of them like Iodine 131, MIBG 131, Lutetium 177, Yttrium 90, Ge-68-Ga 68 generator, cold Kits for Tc 99m, Rubidium 82 are not manufactured in India, sources said.

The industry has also sought rationalisation of duty exemptions to bring in more clarity and less disputes, as different medical devices have either partial or full exemption under various entries in different notifications. Another suggestion was to reduce excise duty from current 10 per cent to nil on locally purchased input for the manufacture of medical equipment, spares, accessories etc.

Source : pharmabiz.com