DV Sadananda Gowda, Minister for Chemicals and Fertilisers, launched the 9th edition of  Organisation of Pharmaceutical Producers of India (OPPI)’s Annual Summit - Healthcare Accelerated with the theme India’s Healthcare Transformational Journey, through the virtual platform on 17 December.

The two-day summit began with an address by Sharad Tyagi, President, OPPI on ‘Reimagining India’s Healthcare in the next decade’, followed by an address by KG Ananthakrishanan, Director General, OPPI on ‘Refreshing Research’. 

The first day of the Summit witnessed key note speeches by S Aparna, Secretary, Department of Pharmaceuticals; and Dr Shamika Ravi, Former Member, Prime Minister's Economic Advisory Council and Research Director, Brookings Institution, US.

Launching the Summit, Gowda commended on the efforts of global and Indian companies, research institutes, government regulators and hospitals for supporting the COVID-19 vaccine development and its clinical trials. “The contribution of Indian pharmaceutical sector has been reinforced during this pandemic year when the companies, global and Indian, stepped in and stepped up their efforts in service of the country. I have no doubt to believe that these collaborations and the maturity demonstrated by the collaborations are going to define the Indian pharmaceutical sector in the years ahead.”

He further added, “India has attracted large scale inflow of foreign direct investment to the pharmaceutical sector and the Medical Devices sector. As a matter of record, pharmaceuticals export from India was over $20 billion in the year 2019-20 and is expected to cross $25 billion by the end of the current financial year. This was at a time when the domestic market has crossed $22 billion last year. It is indeed poised for much higher growth.”

The summit conferred the Lifetime Achievement Award to Dr YK Hamied, Founder, Cipla Ltd and the Special Recognition Award to Dr VG Somani, Drugs Controller General of India (DGCI).

In a special session on COVID-19 Vaccine Updates, Jaak Peeters, Johnson & Johnson Special Envoy for COVID-19 Vaccine and Narender Mantena, Head of Global Strategy & CEO, Specialty Generic Injectables & Synthetic Biology, Biological E Ltd shared the global efforts on vaccine development with Sarthak Ranade, Managing Director, Janssen India.