• Cheap drugs, eh? Cheap drugs, eh? With each passing day, it becomes clearer that cheap Canadian medications won’t solve America’s prescription drug problem. They are, at best, a Band-Aid – an illegal Band-Aid at that. It’s against the law
• Cheap drugs, eh?
Cheap drugs, eh?
With each passing day, it becomes clearer that cheap Canadian medications won’t solve America’s prescription drug problem. They are, at best, a Band-Aid – an illegal Band-Aid at that.
It’s against the law for individuals to import prescription drugs, but that hasn’t stopped millions of Americans from doing it. Nor has it stopped Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich, who is leading a handful of states and cities that have proposed joining the cross-border traffic. Mr. Blagojevich wants to buy drugs in Canada for state employees and retirees.
The idea is a political winner. Last month, Mr. Blagojevich released excerpts from a report that claims Illinois taxpayers could save nearly $91 million annually by buying Canadian drugs. “Should Americans be able to save money by safely importing prescription drugs from Canada?” asks a headline on the governor’s Web site.
But the headline, and the flawed report upon which it is based, beg the question. The issue isn’t whether Americans should be able to “safely import drugs.” Rather, it’s whether importing drugs is safe. Mr. Blagojevich’s report insists it is. But the report was prepared without speaking to either Canadian regulators or, more importantly, drug wholesalers. What difference does it make? Plenty.
The report notes that Canada has standards similar to the United States for everything from training pharmacists to making and packaging drugs. But it fails to mention that Canadian regulators say they can’t guarantee the safety of drugs exported from their country. Nor, apparently, do they intend to try. And while the U.S. Food and Drug Administration inspects foreign and domestic factories where drugs are made, it has little regulatory oversight of pharmaceutical wholesalers.
Even if the safety and legal questions could be put to rest, the Canadian solution looks increasingly tenuous. Pharmacists from Manitoba visited Springfield, Ill., last week to ask that Mr. Blagojevich reconsider. Their country could run out of drugs if Illinois, Massachusetts and other states go forward with plans to buy Canadian medicines.
Meanwhile, American drug makers are cracking down on Canadian companies that export to America. Pfizer Canada recently raised prices. Three other big companies quickly followed. Another big drug maker, AstroZeneca, is demanding written assurances that its products won’t be exported.
American consumers are understandably upset about paying the world’s highest prices for drugs. We, along with a handful of European nations, pay for the world’s pharmaceutical research through those high prices and taxpayer subsidies for scientific studies. The prices in Canada are lower, partly because Canadians are paying little for research. It’s not surprising that Americans want a way around high prices. But this isn’t it.
A better solution is for the U.S. government and state governments to centralize purchasing for Medicare, Medicaid and state workers in order to obtain volume discounts. Mr. Blagojevich’s Band-Aid solution just raises false hopes and unwanted dangers.
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
