A separate department can boost medical devices industry in India

The domestic medical devices manufacturers are of the view that a separate Department would define priority devices to fight priority diseases and implement the strategy to shift India's import dependency from over 70-80% to less than 30% in next 5 years for priority devices and next 10 years for all devices

The medical devices industry in the country has recently sought Prime Minister Narendra Modi's intervention to either change the name of Department of Pharmaceuticals (DoP) to Department of Pharmaceuticals & Medical Devices or set up a separate Department of Medical Devices so that the domestic medical devices manufacturers will be assured that the government is taking this fledgling sector seriously as medical devices are not pharmaceuticals, though both may be medical products.

By creating a separate Department for Medical Devices, the industry wanted to make India one of top five manufacturing hubs for medical devices worldwide and be nodal interface of manufacturing industry with all central government departments to catalyze the growth of the Indian medical device sector. The domestic medical devices manufacturers are of the view that a separate Department would define priority devices to fight priority diseases and implement the strategy to shift India's import dependency from over 70-80 per cent to less than 30 per cent in next five years for priority devices and next 10 years for all devices.

It also aims to create a forum for close working between users, developers, manufacturers and academia with the Department of Science & Technology (DST), Department of Biotechnology

(DBT), Biotechnology Industry Research Assistance Council (BIRAC), Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), Department of Scientific and Industrial Research (DSIR), Kalam Institute, etc.

It is a fact that during the financial year 2021-22 compared to previous years, imports of medical devices have grown an alarming 41 percent as India imported medical devices worth Rs. 63,200 crore in 2021-22, up 41 per cent from Rs. 44,708 crore in 2020-21. China remained at the top of import source for India as medical device imports from China grew 48 per cent from Rs 9,112 crore in 2020-21 to Rs 13,538 crore in 2021-22. Imports from the USA also increased steeply by 48 per cent to Rs 10,245 crore in 2021-22 from Rs 6,919 crore in 2020-21.

The value of medical devices from China was nearly the same as the combined value of imports from Germany, Singapore and the Netherlands in 2021-22. The gravity of the situation can be gauged from the fact that the increase of import of medical devices has been five-fold over a six-year period as India imported Rs12,866 crore worth of medical devices in 2016-17. The trend is alarming and there should be some mechanism to reverse it. Up to an extent, the creation of a separate Department for Medical Devices will be the answer. A two per cent customs duty surcharge on imports of the 151 of Eight Digit HS Code that constitute medical devices can be used to create a corpus to finance the Department and provide outlay for supporting creation of infrastructure of existing clusters and proposed medical devices technology parks.

The remodelled department can facilitate creation and development of clusters for medical devices, creation of laboratories and service centres under PPP and skill development of personnel in field of manufacturing, sales, service and regulations. India still remains 80 percent import dependent on medical devices with imports crossing Rs. 63,200 crore in 2021-22 and an estimated market of Rs 1,60,000 crore at retail and institutional level but with a huge investment opportunity of over Rs 80,000 crore. It is true that the Department of Pharmaceuticals and the Ministry of Chemicals & Fertilizers have so far had limited success to carry out the mandate given to them to boost domestic manufacturing of medical devices and address the 70 to 80 per cent import dependency and have limited expertise of the medical devices industry as the high precision medical device industry has very little synergy with Chemical & Fertilizers Industry. So, there should be a nodal coordinating centre exclusively for the medical devices sector.

The division of Healthcare Technology at National Health Systems Resource Centre (NHSRC) should be given the task of being the Nodal Coordinating Centre for all Health Technology related issues related to medical devices not only for Ministry of Health but for all stakeholder Departments like the DoP, Department of Commerce, Department of Electronics, Department of Science & Technology, Department of Industrial Policy & Promotion, etc. The current name of DoP reflects the focus on the sector of pharmaceuticals and has ignored the import dependent sector of medical devices. A separate Department may boost the fledgling domestic medical devices sector. The government should seriously ponder over the issue.

(The author is freelance journalist with varied experience in different fields)