Pharmacy Daily | No cough up says India

INDIA'S pharmaceutical exports this fiscal year are set to grow nearly twice as fast as last year to hit sales of US$27 billion (A$40 billion), driven by strong US buying, a government-backed trade body told Reuters, despite deaths linked to Indian-made cough syrups.

The robust forecast comes against the backdrop of earlier concerns from the government that last year's deaths of dozens of children in Gambia, which the World Health Organization (WHO) linked to drugs made in India, had "adversely impacted the image of India's pharmaceutical products across the globe".

Two other cough syrups made in India killed 19 children in Uzbekistan late last year, according to the Uzbekistan government.

India is the world's third-largest maker of drugs by volume after the United States and China, and senior pharma trade official Udaya Bhaskar said the country was too big a player for buyers to move away because of "these aberrations" in Gambia and Uzbekistan.

"As far as the Gambia and Uzbekistan incidents are concerned, if you see in terms of the image of the country, there is a dent," said Bhaskar, Director General of the Pharmaceuticals Export Promotion Council of India.

India has denied links to the deaths in Gambia but found another company guilty of sending adulterated products to Uzbekistan and cancelled its licence.

The company, Marion Biotech, has denied wrongdoing.

India's cough syrup exports, including those made by drugmakers that follow the traditional Indian method of Ayurveda, are only about US$15 million (A$22 million) a year and exports have largely remained intact, Bhaskar explained.

Apart from Gambia, no other country has asked for additional tests for Indian drugs since the deaths, he asserted.

"Whatever exports we are doing to countries like the US, our largest importer, they are not asking.

"There are so many countries we are exporting to - the UK, South Africa, Brazil or any other market.

"They are not asking."