India signals shift on stent pricing cap

November 13, 2017 By Sarah Faulkner Leave a Comment

India’s National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority is slated to revisit its decision to impose price caps on coronary stents in February of 2018 and it is looking for input from manufacturers, the agency said in a statement last week.

The NPPA capped prices for drug-eluting stents and bioresorbable scaffolds in February this year, while also cutting the prices for all coronary stents by as much as 85%. The move was largely criticized by companies within the medical device industry.

Abbott(NYSE:ABT) announced earlier this month that it won’t introduce its next-gen drug-eluting stent, Xience Alpine, in the Indian market due to the price caps. Boston Scientific (NYSE:BSX) is looking pull its Synergy device from the market for the same reason.

In October, AdvaMed filed a petition with the U.S. Trade Representative seeking to suspend Generalized System of Preferences benefits to India over the price cap issue.

The GSP is a preferential trade program used by the U.S. to give duty-free treatment for imports from developing countries. It’s designed to give incentives to boost access to American goods and services, according to the medical device industry’s lobbying group.

AdvaMed said it could see no other viable alternative outside of the petition to convince India to lift the price caps.

“AdvaMed and its members are deeply concerned about recently implemented price controls on coronary stents and knee replacement implants in India that have slashed prices by as much as 85% and 70%, respectively, followed by signals that price caps for additional life-saving and life-improving medical devices may be forthcoming,” president & CEO Scott Whitaker said in a press release.

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