This past June, during a debate in the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee, Senator Richard Burr (R-NC), the committee’s Ranking Member, demonstrated that he does not understand very important developments in our nation’s approach to drug regulation and safety. It was almost as if Sen. Burr had fallen asleep over 20 years ago and woke […]
DOJ Investigates $250 Million in U.S. Sales of Counterfeit Drugs Using Fake DSCSA Pedigrees
The U.S. Department of Justice, according to Seeking Alpha, is investigating the sale and distribution of counterfeit drugs in the U.S. that may have amounted to a quarter-billion dollars. The investigation comes about two months after The Wall Street Journal reported on a lawsuit filed by Gilead Sciences alleging a massive breach in the U.S. drug supply chain […]
Manitoba Judge’s Opinion Reveals Different Side of the CanadaDrugs Case
A recent opinion from an appeals court in Manitoba, Canada sheds new and more favorable light about the CanadaDrugs-related wholesale drug importation case that was first covered a decade ago in the Wall Street Journal. The case pertained to an indictment of CanadaDrugs, Ltd. for sales of mostly misbranded (but not counterfeit drugs) and two […]
Mark Cuban’s Pharmacy Dreams Are Generic
Mark Cuban’s new online pharmacy venture – the Mark Cuban Cost Plus Drug Company (“Cost Plus Drug”) – will not help overcome the biggest obstacle to drug affordability in America, which is drug company monopolies on patented brand name prescription drugs. When only one company makes a drug and can charge as much as the […]
State Boards of Pharmacy Missing in Action During Opioid Crisis
This post should serve as the beginning of a serious inquiry into the failure of U.S. state boards of pharmacy to properly regulate pharmacies that irresponsibly and too often illegally profited from opioid drug sales to patients. Sociologist Elizabeth Chiarello writes, “Boards have a duty to protect the public, but because they are mostly comprised […]
The Domain Reform for Unlawful Drug Sellers Act is Big Pharma’s Bill
UPDATE: Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) has withdrawn her sponsorship and support for this bill. A new bill introduced by Sens. Mark Rubio (R-FL) and Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), called the “Domain Reform for Unlawful Drug Sellers Act’’ or, for short, the ‘‘DRUGS Act,’’ could effectively end online access to safe and affordable imported medicines for Americans. […]
How Pharma-Funded Groups Lie About Personal Drug Imports
For the past decade, I’ve written extensively about my view that pharma-funded organizations and initiatives are responsible for misleading Americans about the safety of buying more affordable prescription drugs over the Internet for import from Canada and other countries. Most of that writing was on PharmacyCheckerBlog – but periodically it shows up in national media, […]
Fewer New Drugs but Affordable Access for Existing Ones: The Big Elephant in the Room
Would you vote for legislation to lower drug prices that would lead to a five percent reduction in pharmaceutical innovation — yet simultaneously create a health system in which all Americans could afford the prescription drugs they need? That’s compared to the one we have now where a quarter of Americans struggle with drug prices. […]
Becerra’s Vote for Drug Importation in 2003
Yesterday, former California Attorney General Xavier Becerra was narrowly confirmed (50-49) by the U.S. Senate to become Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services. Congratulations! Before he was AG, he was Congressman Becerra. And as Kaiser Health News reminded us in January, Rep. Becerra (D-CA) voted for the “Canadian drug importation law” in […]
Return of the MEDS Act? Colorado Seeks Drug Imports Beyond Canada
This past week, to lower drug costs, a bill was introduced in the Colorado legislature – SENATE BILL 21-123 – to allow drug imports from countries other than Canada. Colorado, which passed a law in 2019 allowing drug importation from Canada, apparently wants access to even lower cost drugs than Canada can offer. It’s also a way to address the real obstacle that Canada’s population is only 11% the size of the U.S. population and excess drugs supplies are limited. State of Reform does a nice job covering this bill, but this post gives some underlying and important history.