Price Monitoring and Research Unit (PMRU)
What is the News?
- Kerala has become the first State to set up a price monitoring and research unit (PMRU) to track violation of prices of essential drugs and medical devices under the Drugs Price Control Order (DPCO).
- The move comes more than five years after the National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA) proposed such a system for the States and the Union Territories.
Composition of PMRU
- The State Health Secretary would be the Chairman of the society and the Drugs Controller would be its member secretary.
- Its members include a State government representative, representatives of private pharmaceutical companies, and those from consumer rights protection fora.
- The society would also have an executive committee headed by the Drugs Controller.
Role of PMRU
- The new watchdog will offer technical help to the State Drug Controllers and the NPPA to,
- monitor notified prices of medicines,
- detect violation of the provisions of the DPCO,
- look at price compliance, collect test samples of medicines, and
- collect and compile market-based data of scheduled as well as non-scheduled formulations.
The suggestion to set up PMRUs was made against the backdrop of the lack of a field-level link between the NPPA and the State Drugs Controllers and State Drug Inspectors to monitor drug prices.
About NPPA
- National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority is a government regulatory agency that controls the prices of pharmaceutical drugs in India.It was formed on 29 August 1997.
- NPPA fixes ceiling price of essential medicines that are listed in Schedule I of DPCO, 2013.