Duty Exemption For Diagnostic Kits Imports

New Delhi, 30 April 2021:

To boost the testing apparatus for COVID-19 across the country and ease the availability of oxygen concentrators, the government on Friday notified a customs duty exemption for diagnostic kits imports and altered the foreign trade policy.

The Department of Revenue exempted imports of inflammatory diagnostic (marker) kits, namely IL6, D-Dimer, CRP, LDH, Ferritin, Pro Calcitonin (PCT) and blood gas reagents, from customs duty till October 31, 2021 to supplement testing efforts, the Finance Ministry said in a statement.

Separately, the foreign trade policy for 2015-20 (in force till a new policy is formalised) was tweaked to allow the import of oxygen concentrators for personal use through e-commerce portals, post or courier till July 31, 2021. Customs clearance will be granted for such imports by treating them on par with ‘gifts’. So far, such an exemption was only allowed for life saving drugs and Rakhis.

Allocation doubled

The daily allocation to States of the Tocilizumab drug, prescribed for certain critical COVID-19 patients, was more than doubled on Friday, but shortages are likely to persist in some States. On April 27, the Centre had kicked off an interim arrangement to allocate the drug to States from limited imports as Tocilizumab supplies in the country had run out a few weeks ago.

From 3,045 doses of the drug allotted to 18 States on April 27, the Department of Pharmaceuticals and the Health Ministry have now allotted 8,700 doses to 23 States. No additional allocations have been made to Delhi and Punjab, but 285 doses are now earmarked for West Bengal compared to none earlier. The quota for Central government allocations has been raised from 200 to 1,200.The Hindu