A Government Panel Declined

BE PREPARED TO QUIT"An aide to Modi said companies were being asked to bring down prices of medical devices "or be prepared to quit" the country, and a bureaucrat who works closely with the prime ministers office said raising the matter to diplomatic levels would not influence Indias position.US-based companies such as Boston Scientific Corp and Abbott Laboratories sell heart stents in India, while Johnson & Johnson sells other devices.Following the February decision, Abbott moved to withdraw one of its stents from India, but its plea was rejected by Modis government.Boston Scientific - which also has a research base near New Delhi - sought a higher price for one of its stents but a government panel declined the request.Such decisions, the group of U.S. Congress members wrote, had forced companies to sell "leading edge technology in India at a loss". Signatories to the letter included Indiana Republican Jackie Walorski, and Ron Kind, a Wisconsin Democrat. Both are members of the House Ways and Means CommitteeBefore the pricing order, for example, Boston Scientific was selling its high-end Synergy stent for about 3,000 in India, well above its 750 cost, according to wholesale conventional bandages a company document seen by Reuters.

The new cap reduces the price to 450, and the company says it would result in losses of at least 7 million this year.Indian health activists have lauded the government decision to cap # heart stent prices, saying it is in the public interest."It was found that huge unethical mark-ups are charged at each stage in the supply chain of coronary stents resulting in irrational, restrictive and exorbitant prices in a failed market system," the Indian government said in February.A month later, India's federal drug pricing regulator privately asked the health ministry to add at least four more medical devices to a list of essential medicines, opening the way for them to be made subject to price controls.In their letter, the U.S. lawmakers echoed concerns raised by the medical device industry, saying India's interventionist policy on pricing would hamper innovation and jeopardise investment."We are especially worried that comments by government officials signal the intention to double down on this dangerous policy and expand price cuts to other medical devices," they wrote in their letter.