The Supreme Court today sought the Centre's response on conducting an independent inquiry into alleged illegal clinical trials of untested drugs by pharmaceutical companies in various states.
A bench of Justice RLodha and Justice HL Gokhale issued a notice to the Centre as also to the Health Ministry and the Medical Council of India seeking their replies on a Public Interest Litigation alleging that the country is being used for illegal clinical trials by the multinational corporation because laws are not implemented strictly.
"India is being used for conducting clinical trials by the multinational corporation owing to the reason that the laws are not implemented strictly, because of legal lacunae and because of poverty and other economic reasons the subjects for these trials are easily available," advocate Sanjay Parekh, appearing for the petitioner, said.
The court passed the order on a PIL filed by Indore-based NGO Swasthya Adhikar Manch which sought appointment of an expert committee to regulate the clinical trials done by many multinational pharmaceutical companies.
The petitioner-NGO pointed out various cases of illegal drug trials are going on in the country and said such trials must be stopped immediately and requested the apex court's intervention in the matter.
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