Daijiworld Media Network - New Delhi
New Delhi, Oct 6: The Jan Swasthya Abhiyan (JSA) and the Working Group on Access to Medicines and Treatment have called for urgent government intervention to regulate charges levied by private hospitals and cap trade margins on medicines, medical devices and medical consumables.
The demand comes amid renewed scrutiny of private hospital pricing, particularly after the Supreme Court raised concerns over steep mark-ups on medicines sold through hospital pharmacies. The court recently took note of a case in which a cancer medicine procured for around Rs 2,700 was being sold with an MRP of about Rs 27,000 — nearly a ten-fold difference. It also questioned practices requiring patients to purchase medicines from hospital-linked pharmacies and asked the Centre to examine regulation of trade margins.
In a joint statement issued on Monday, October 5, the groups said patients continued to face excessive and arbitrary charges for treatment, medicines and consumables, with limited avenues to challenge hospital bills.
The organisations said India lacked an effective nationwide mechanism to regulate what private hospitals could charge for procedures, services, medicines and consumables. They pointed to the Clinical Establishments Act, 2010, which provides a legal framework for regulating clinical establishments and envisages government-determined ranges of charges, but said the law had not been effectively implemented across the country.
The groups said publicly available data indicated that leading corporate hospital chains charged an average of around Rs 60,000 to Rs 78,000 per day of treatment. JSA co-convenor Dr Abhay Shukla said some major hospital chains had generated estimated surpluses ranging from Rs 22 lakh to Rs 55 lakh per bed annually in recent years.
The organisations have sought ceilings on charges for procedures, services and treatment at private hospitals, besides maximum trade margins on medicines, medical devices and medical consumables.
They also called for greater transparency in hospital billing and procurement. The groups argued that the printed MRP should not allow hospitals to charge patients several times their procurement cost, particularly where patients are required to buy medicines and medical products from hospital pharmacies.
Working Group co-convenor Jyotsna Singh said patients paying out of their own pockets could be particularly vulnerable because hospitals often negotiate package rates with insurance companies and government health schemes, while self-paying patients may face higher and non-standardised charges.
The groups further raised concerns over the increasing financialisation of healthcare, arguing that revenue targets and financial incentives could create pressure for unnecessary diagnostic tests, procedures or more expensive treatment options.
They have also sought a time-bound investigation by the Competition Commission of India into potentially anti-competitive practices in the private hospital sector, along with accessible grievance mechanisms for patients facing excessive bills.
The issue has also drawn attention from state regulators. Recent inspections in Karnataka reportedly found medicines being billed at mark-ups as high as 52 times their procurement cost, while inspections in Uttar Pradesh found some hospitals selling medicines at substantially higher prices than their purchase costs.
Private hospital representatives, however, have argued that individual drug or consumable prices should not be considered in isolation because hospitals incur costs for storage, trained personnel, administration, biomedical waste disposal and other aspects of clinical care. Max Healthcare chairman and managing director Abhay Soi said hospital pricing should be viewed across the wider clinical value chain.
The health groups have also called for increased public spending and stronger public healthcare services to reduce patients' dependence on expensive private treatment.