"This is not just a problem of Ranbaxy or Wockhardt and neither was any witch-hunting happening against the Indian companies," K Satish Reddy, vice chairman and managing director of Dr Reddy's, said on Saturday.
He was responding to a question on whether the import ban issued last week on Ranbaxy's Mohali facility by FDA was an isolated case or a problem to worry other Indian generic players. Reddy reiterated the need to focus and invest in manufacturing standards, which is the one thing that requires utmost attention, more particularly in the face of growing scrutiny.
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However, Reddy said import alerts were not uncommon to foreign companies either, but the kind of negative publicity generated in our country when an Indian company got an import alert was not seen anywhere.
On the likely gain by the Indian pharmaceutical companies from the recent fall in the rupee value, Reddy said the long-term impact of the currency volatility had to be assessed even though there could be some gain in the short term on the dollar front.
He added the rupee depreciation also impacted he pharma players as they too imported certain raw materials.
Centre for Disease Biology
As India is home to the highest number of diabetic patients in the world, the research institutes should take it as an opportunity to find a solution for the whole world in curing the disease, the minister said.
According to Satish Reddy, Dr Reddy's continues to focus on drug research targeting diabetes though it had abandoned research on a previous class of molecules as it was getting nowhere.