Indian Medical reps banned during working hours

The news that medical reps will no longer be able to see medical professionals during working hours in India will send shudders down the spine of many medical reps in the UK.  In a climate of increasing pressure on the time and resources of Doctors, alongside increasing expectations of patients, the potential impact of this on access to GPs is a constant worry to the pharmaceutical sales industry.

Already, some areas of the UK, such as Glasgow have suffered 'experimental 'bans' preventing medical reps from seeing individual GPs and rendering many sales people a useless resource.

These moves however have not been without consequence as some pharmaceutical companies responded by withdrawing their funding of NHS resources.

In principle, the move seems a logical and simple one to give GPs time to patients and not reps, but this ignores the role and benefits offered by medical reps and the pharmaceutical industry which has worked so well for many years now.  In the Uk the medical sales industry has offered a well regulated balance between education and support alongside the ethical promotion of their products, it would be a shame to see a political move changed what has worked so well for so long.