The State Development and Reform Commission announced on Wednesday it was lowering the upper limit on the retail sales prices of 22 categories of medicine.

The prices of the medicines, which involve more than 400 specific medicinal products, are expected to fall an average of some 40 percent.

The move, which aims to instill market order and relieve the high cost of medicine, one of the key complains of the Chinese people, has the potential to save consumers about 4 billion yuan (494 million US dollars), an official with the commission said.

The government will further reduce the prices of other government-controlled medicines and enhance supervision of medicines and medical products which are priced in accordance with market demand, the official noted.

The official attributed the price cut mainly to the lowering production cost of medicine producers due to large-scale production and technological progress.

Source: Xinhua