“Our purpose is to enable people with lifealtering conditions to lead better lives,” Says Vineet Singhal, Country Head, Baxalta Bioscience India Pvt Ltd (Now part of Shire). in an exclusive interview with Mahesh Kallayil, he further talks about potential oppor tunit ies in rare disease market, ensuring affordability of specialty medicines, business strategies and much more.
Can you briefly explain about Shire's vision and its focus areas in India?
Shire is a leading global biotechnology company committed to serving people affected with rare diseases and other highly specialized conditions. These diseases (many of which are genetic) are often misunderstood, undiagnosed, and potentially life-threatening.
Shire keeps patients at the centre of everything we do. In India, we are focused on two therapeutic categories, one being Hematology with our portfolio covering antihemophilia factors. Hemophilia is an X-linked congenital bleeding disorder caused by a deficiency of coagulation factor VIII (FVIII ) Hemophilia A or factor IX (FIX) Hemophilia B. The deficiency is the result of mutations of the respective clotting factor genes.
The second broad franchise in India is Immunology where we sell high-quality albumin and immunoglobulins, which are used under critical care by leading hospitals across India. We have widened our reach across the country and are present in every state.
How do you see rare disease market in India?
The biggest challenge that we see is that awareness and understanding of most rare diseases remains limited in India.
Therefore our primary focus will be on three areas: the first is to increase awareness of these conditions amongst the medical community. Our second focus will be to improve the means of diagnosis for rare diseases. Thirdly and most importantly we want to make therapies accessible to patients.
This story is from the June 2017 edition of Pharma Bio World.
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This story is from the June 2017 edition of Pharma Bio World.
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