Editorials
Colorado submitted its application to the FDA to import medicine from Canada on December 5. Like other Canadian importation plans, this one isn’t safe and it’s unlikely to save money.
This editorial by Peter J. Pitts was published in The Times Weekly on March 3, 2020. Mr. Pitts is president of the Center for Medicine in the Public Interest and a former FDA associate commissioner. Keep Canadian drugs out of U.S. medicine cabinets The Trump administration recently proposed two rules that would allow states, pharmacies, and drug wholesalers to import non-FDA approved medicines from Canada. No administration, Republican or Democrat, has ever allowed Canadian drug importation – and for good reason. First, experts agree that such a scheme wouldn’t reduce by one penny the co-pay of a single American. Second,…
We recently ran an ad in Florida about the dangers of attempting to import medicine from Canada, and the risk of getting medicine from other countries like China where much of the world’s counterfeits come from. WESH 2 News serving Orlando put the ad through their exclusive Truth Test on April 25, 2019, and the claims in the ad rang true. The truth test found that, “Right now, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services refuses to allow Canadian drug imports, yet many Americans order them online, thinking they’re made in Canada. They’re not.” They went on to investigate where the…
The Partnership for Safe Medicines applauds the passage of the SUPPORT Act, an $8 billion package which will help develop non-addictive painkillers, improve prescription drug monitoring programs, establish comprehensive opioid recovery centers, and strengthen Customs and Border Protection’s ability to intercept fentanyl that is illegally shipped into the United States.
As a licensed pharmacist, I’m all too familiar with patients’ difficulties getting medications they need and their physician has prescribed. As baby boomers age, pharmacists see more patients at our counters unable to obtain needed treatments for heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, and other chronic illnesses. This issue is now being acknowledged and a healthy debate has begun over possible solutions. But one idea policymakers shouldn’t pursue is opening up our country’s secure drug supply to medicines coming from outside our borders.