Indian pharmaceutical market: Decline in Volumes Impacts Overall market Growth, says Ind-Ra

Biznextindia : India Ratings and Research (Ind-Ra) highlights that the Indian pharmaceutical market (IPM) delivered slower growth of 5.0% in October 2021 than 12.4% in September 2021.

The acute therapy segment (up 8.1% yoy) performed relatively better than chronic segment (up 2.3% yoy). The acute therapy segment demonstrated robust performance since March 2021 (average growth at 30% yoy) owing to lower base last year. Post normalisation of the high growth months of April 2021 (up 51.5% yoy) and May 2021 (up 47.8%) led by the Covid-19-led lockdown related lower base last year and higher volume growth, the average IPM growth from June to October 2021 has been healthy (up 12.6% yoy). The price growth, new product launches growth and volume growth stood at 5.5% yoy, 3.5% yoy and 5.6% yoy, respectively, which led to the overall IPM size of INR1,657 billion in October 2021 (September 2021: INR1,444 billion).

Acute Therapy Segment Continues to Report Healthy Growth

The acute therapy segment reported sales growth of 8.1% yoy  in October 2021(September 2021: 17.7% yoy; August 2021: 16.9% yoy), while chronic and sub-chronic therapy segments reported growth of 1.9% yoy (7.4% yoy; 10.8% yoy) and 2.9% yoy (8.9%; 15.3%), respectively. During FY21, the acute therapy segment reported a decline on account of COVID-19 while the chronic therapy segment reported an average growth of 7.0%.