http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20010905/hl/drugs_1.html
Wednesday September 5 5:26 PM ET
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A key US Senate
Democrat said Wednesday he will introduce legislation to let Americans
obtain lower priced prescription drugs from Canada now that the US government
refuses to implement a broader law passed last year.
Declaring that Americans pay more
for prescription drugs than anyone in the world, Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-ND)
lambasted the Republican administration of President George W. Bush (news
- web sites) and his Democratic predecessor, Bill Clinton, for frustrating
congressional efforts to fix the situation.
At a Senate Commerce subcommittee
hearing, Dorgan waved bottles of medicine he said cost twice as much in
the United States as in Canada and said Americans now had to drive to Canada
if they wanted to take advantage of the price differential.
The Medicine Equity and Drug Safety
Act passed last year would have addressed the problem by allowing US pharmacists
and drug wholesalers to reimport US-approved drugs from other countries
and sell them at a discount, he said.
But both the Clinton and Bush administrations
refused to implement the law, citing safety concerns. Supporters of the
reimportation plan suspect both administrations backed down under pressure
from the pharmaceutical industry.
Banning the reimportation of drugs
was a "sweetheart deal" for drug makers, but a "raw deal" for consumers,
said Dorgan, chairman of the subcommittee on consumer affairs. "I don't
want to compromise the safety of our drug supply, but neither do I want
our consumers handcuffed.
"I think it's likely we'll reintroduce
the same legislation and pass it, dealing just with Canada," he said,
adding that just as cross-border agreements had been made on items like
meat, any drug safety problems could be addressed.
Dorgan said the long-term goal was
not to promote cheaper medicine from Canada, but to force the US drug companies
to lower drug prices, "so Americans are not paying the highest prices
for prescription drugs of any country in the world."
William Hubbard, a senior associate
commissioner at the Food and Drug Administration (news - web sites) (FDA),
said the Bush administration believes reimporting drugs from other countries,
even Canada, is risky because the FDA does not have oversight there.
"I just don't think we could provide
the same assurances for any drug imported from Canada," he told Dorgan.
The pharmaceutical industry countered
that instead of devising reimportation schemes, Congress should enact a
prescription drug benefit for elderly citizens.
Canada's drug price controls make
it difficult for Canadians to get innovative medicines, argued Majorie
Powell of the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America.
"We should learn from Canada's mistakes--not
import them," she told the subcommittee.
Sens. James Jeffords (news - web
sites) (I-VT) and Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) said they backed a reimportation
scheme. Dorgan's aides thought the idea enjoyed a majority in Congress,
but in July the Republican-led House rejected a farther-reaching version
of what Dorgan is proposing now.
Copyright © 2001 Reuters Limited
By Susan Cornwell