Mumbai: Private hospitals’ body Nathealth has pushed back after the Maharashtra FDA flagged high markups on hospital consumables, saying that the procurement price of a device cannot automatically be equated with the price incurred by the patient.
The healthcare body disagreed with the notion of levying a fixed markup on consumables, adding that hospitals should not be considered mere resellers of medical devices.
Instead, Nathealth called for an evidence-based and differentiated framework that distinguishes basic consumables from clinically differentiated and high-complexity medical technologies.
Siddhartha Bhattacharya, Secretary General, Nathealth, said, “For sophisticated medical devices and consumables, the hospital is not merely a reseller. Before a technology reaches the patient, the hospital may undertake clinical evaluation and selection, maintain multiple configurations and emergency inventory, ensure sterile-chain integrity and traceability, provide trained clinical and biomedical teams, manage expiry and obsolescence risks, maintain specialised infrastructure, ensure safe disposal and assume responsibility for quality, safety and outcomes while ensuring compliance with all safety regulations.”He added, “The procurement price of a device cannot automatically be equated with its true cost of delivery to the patient. Equally, extraordinarily high margins on routine, commoditised consumables deserve scrutiny and should not be justified by costs associated with sophisticated technologies.”
“We therefore need an evidence-based and differentiated framework that distinguishes basic consumables from clinically differentiated and high-complexity medical technologies. The policy objective should not simply be to focus on a fixed markup; it should be to determine what constitutes a fair and transparent patient price after recognising the legitimate cost and value involved in making the technology clinically available and integrating it as part of an overall package that is reimbursed either by the patient or insurance.
The Association of Healthcare Providers of India (AHPI) also echoed these views stating that the issue needs to be examined in its proper regulatory and administering context.
The body added that selective examples of price differentials between procurement prices and patient billing prices should not be used to suggest systemic collusion between hospitals and manufacturers or to attribute the setting of Maximum Retail Prices (MRPs) to hospitals.
“It is important to distinguish between the procurement price of a medical product and its MRP. Hospitals do not determine the MRP printed on medicines and medical products. MRP is determined by the manufacturer, and is subject to regulation by NPPA; price of any non-scheduled medical device is regulated by the Central Government and price increase of only upto 10% in a year is permitted,” said Dr. Girdhar Gyani, Director General, Association of Healthcare Providers (India)
This comes after Maharashtra FDA Commissioner Tukaram Mundhe flagged markups of as high as 2,800 per cent on certain hospital consumables, such as syringes and catheters.
In a post on social media platform X, Mundhe cited a survey of hospital consumables in Maharashtra that found an IV infusion set with a trade price of ₹11.05 carrying a printed MRP of ₹325, a markup of 2,841 per cent. A syringe procured at ₹6.75 carried an MRP of ₹57.20, while a catheter procured at ₹29.41 carried an MRP of ₹310.
“These are not elective purchases. Patients cannot compare prices, seek alternatives, or question a number printed on a box while receiving care, and the MRP itself is often fixed upstream by manufacturers and distributors, disconnected from the trade price by a wide, unexplained margin. The result is a system where the party bearing the cost has the least information to evaluate it,” he said.
