“Rs. 2 lakh to 4 lakh a month” paid to doctors for just being part of silly studies, reveals investigation
When Andhra Pradesh Medical Council(APMC) started digging into the details of the nexus between an Ahmedabad-based pharma company and 40 doctors from Telangana and Andhra Pradesh, they unearthed a deep nexus which involved several other companies.
- Doctors were found to be pushing sale of drugs of half a dozen other companies in exchange of gifts.
- According to the ethics committee of the medical council, doctors struck ‘deals’ with half a dozen pharmaceutical companies with a monthly pay ranging from Rs 2 lakh to Rs 4 lakh for providing monthly statistics on number of people they treated, patients with blood pressure (BP) or diabetics they checked, etc.
- The passports of most of those who turned up during the two-day hearing revealed their extensive foreign trips to US, Australia, UAE, South Africa and Russia, sponsored by different pharma companies.
- The doctors had links with not only with one Ahmedabad-based company, but had taken bribes ranging from Rs 2 lakh to Rs 4 lakh a month from several pharma companies in the name of conducting silly studies and furnishing information.
These actions are all in against of the Indian Medical Council (Professional Conduct, Etiquette and Ethics) Regulations, 2002, which states that –
“A medical practitioner shall not receive any cash or monetary grants from any pharmaceutical and allied healthcare industry for individual purpose in individual capacity under any pretext.”
Dr K Ramesh Reddy, a member of MCI, said in reaction to the above to TOI,
“The nefarious activities of pharmaceutical companies run so deep that it is time for the department of pharmaceuticals, Union ministry of chemical and fertilisers to come up with strict laws to control them from resorting to unethical practice of luring doctors to promote their drugs.”
The ongoing probe has been transferred to the State Medical Council’s Ethics Committee by Medical Council of India. Earlier in the year, 11 doctors were suspended for attending sponsored international conferences and returning favours to a Ahmedabad based company. Recently in an another incident, Nepal earthquake had incidentally exposed one such sponsored trips.
