India's regulators investigate Cipla pricing claims

India's Monopolies and Restrictive Trade Practices Commission has launched an investigation into the pricing of an antiretroviral drug, following the claim reported recently in the Marketletter that the locally-based generic drug major Cipla, has sold the product in Africa for 40% of the price in India (Marketletter August 20). The firm denies selling the generic formulation of US drug major Bristol Myers-Squibb and Gilead Sciences' Atripla (efavirenz, emtricitabine and tenofovir disoproxil fumarate) in Africa under the brand name Viraday, according to The Economic Times of India.

Amar Lulla, Cipla's joint managing director was quoted by the New Dehli-based newspaper as stating "not a single unit has gone to Africa. This would be our response to the Commission." The USA-based non-governmental organization, the AIDS Healthcare Foundation, had previously claimed that Cipla sells a year's treatment of Viraday in Africa for 21,200 rupees ($524) per patient versus 54,000 rupees in India.