India looks to extend price caps to cardiac devices, intraocular lenses

India reportedly has no plans to roll back it price caps on stents and in fact is slated to cap the prices on a trio of other cardiac devices and intraocular lenses.

Citing “sources familiar with the matter,” Reuters reported that Indian regulators are resisting U.S. and domestic pressure to re-think its stance on the price caps.

The caps enacted by India’s National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority on knee implants and cardiac stents have caused major medtech players to seek to withdraw their devices from India. In April 2017, the NPPA rejected applications from Medtronic (NYSE:MDT) and Abbott (NYSE:ABT) to pull their respective Resolute Onyx and Absorb stents (Abbott has since taken Absorb off the global market, citing lackluster sales). The NPPA is already considering further caps for other medical devices.

An anonymous trade ministry official told Reuters today that Indian officials last month stood fast on the caps despite pressure from the U.S. trade representative’s office.

“This position will not change, it is within the right of the government of India [to impose price caps],” the official told the wire service.

What’s more, the NPPA is pushed for more caps to cover cardiac balloons, catheters and guidewires plus intraocular lenses, according to a Feb. 26 letter to India’s health ministry cited by Reuters that called the high-margin devices’ pricing “exorbitant.”

“Because of these exorbitant prices of catheter and balloon, which are many times higher than the stent price itself, the objective of price capping of stents gets diluted,” the NPPA wrote.

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