COVID-19 pushes up sales of cardiac, anti-diabetic drugs

The changes in the medication needs of the masses due to the novel Coronavirus pandemic seems to impacting the operation of pharmaceutical companies with those dealing in respiratory, anti-diabetic, cardiac therapies performing much better than others having anti-infective, gastro, vitamin or pain therapies in their portfolio.

The sudden change in preferred therapies by masses has just taken a sharp turn from pre-COVID period when gastric, vitamin therapies were most widely used. Probably the concern that coronavirus impacts adversely chronic heart, lung and diabetics severely had turned people into buying more of medicines for these ailments.

In the month of June, demand for Cardiac drugs registered the strongest growth of 15.9 % yoy in terms of value and Anti-Diabetic segment grew at 12.7 % yoy due to continued buying during the period of the lockdown.

Similarly, the Neuro segment (+14.6% yoy) saw higher demand but surprisingly value growth for respiratory went down to 4.5 % even though COVID-19 is known to impact this critical functioning of the human body.

Segments in acute therapies like anti infective, Gynaec/Vitamins, pain, gastro where the demand for drugs has always remained higher than others, declined year-on-year in June clearly bringing out the shift in drug use by Indians, especially during the time of lockdown.

The first quarter period (April-June) is seasonally a strong quarter for acute therapies and the demand loss is, thus, unlikely to fully recover.

According to a Emkay research report, the changing preference of drugs by people has also had an impact on the Indian pharmaceutical industry with companies having stronger drug brands dealing with respiratory, cardiac and anti-diabetic therapies (in chronic care) registering growth higher than the industry average.

Accordingly, while Dr Reddy's Labs, Alkem having higher drug concentration in acute exposure category underperformed while the Indian Pharmaceutical Market (IPM), Sun Pharma, Torrent Pharma, Lupin, outperformed the market due to their high chronic portfolio.

Cipla, Glenmark outperformed due to strong respiratory demand, while IPCA benefitted from high hydroxychloroquine sales, which has been touted as wonder drug having potential to positively impact severe COVID-19 patients.

The brokerage report said that after falling for two straight months due to COVID-19, Indian pharmaceutical market (IPM) growth recovered (+5.8 % yoy) in June, led by Cardiac and Anti-Diabetes segments. Volumes fell 1 per cent yoy (vs. 16/13 % fall in April/May) but closer to normal levels of last year. On moving average turnover basis, IPM growth stood at 7 per cent yoy, while volume growth was flat.

"We expect a gradual recovery from Q2 and 6-8 per cent growth for FY21," the report said.