Siddha units in difficulty, high charges for validation and few testing labs

Manufacturers of Siddha medicines in Tamil Nadu are facing major hardships in conducting proper validation tests for their products as there is very few government laboratories for doing the tests  and validation of ISM drugs. The high rates charged by the private labs are not affordable for most of the SSI units for conducting all the necessary tests. Apart from this, lack of trained personnel is a hurdle faced by the existing government lab and the private labs, according to Dr P Jayaprakash Narayanan, chairman of Scientific Advisory Committee, Siddha. He said that  as per pharmacopoeia, different tests are to be conducted for different medicines like choornam, legyam, chendhooram, bhasmam etc. Quality test for particle size, elemental composition, test for heavy metal contents are charged heavily by the private labs. Rs.3000 is charged for each sample and every batch requires testing which becomes expensive for the manufacturers. These high charges also push up the prices of the products. “When Tamil Nadu has a universal acclaim for its traditional Siddha medicines, the state government is not adequately supporting it by not providing infrastructure facilities and technical assistance to up-bring and promote the Siddha healing system. Either the government should upgrade the existing lab at Anna Nagar into the status of a modern testing laboratory with more trained staff, or establish one or two labs in other parts of the state. The shortage of drug testing labs is the best example of the government apathy”, the Siddha expert said.

Source : Pharmabiz