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Pharmacy Pricing and Out-of-Pocket Health Care Expenditure in India

Volume 6 - Issue 1

J Cyril kanmony*

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    • Department of Economics, Scott Christian College, India

    *Corresponding author:J Cyril Kanmony, Professor Emeritus, PG & Research Centre, Department of Economics, Scott Christian College (Autonomous), Nagercoil-629003, Kanniyakumari District, Tamil Nadu, India

Received: June 18, 2018;   Published: June 26, 2018

DOI: 10.26717/BJSTR.2018.06.001299

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Abstract

In India the out-of-pocket (OOP) health care expenditure (about 70%) is much more in comparison with many other countries (only 10% in the UK). The high OOP leads to impoverishment of many families. Every hospital admission pushes many families from APL status into BPL status (addition per year is around 6%). High prices for medicines and other pharmaceutical products, high doctor’s fee and prescription of high priced medicine for ordinary diseases and unnecessary operations are some of the reasons for high OOP. Of all these reasons the ever rising prices of pharmaceutical products (many branded drugs are sold at 200 to 500% profit margin though many are under price control) is the most important one. Prices of many drugs are fixed arbitrarily, much higher than their cost of production (100 to 200% more).

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