Danger: The Active Ingredient in Imported Drugs

When Congress passed landmark Medicare reforms last year, critics opposed a provision banning Americans from buying "Canadian" prescription drugs and a study of the safety and cost benefits of cross border purchasing was mandated in the legislation.

For several years, healthcare policy analysts and health safety experts have produced a cacophony of powerful objections to importation based on worries about safety and pricing. Now adding to the din of serious concern comes this study from the Department of Health and Human Services produced by a respected, international expert panel that not only highlights the dangers of importation, but is likely to shift the tide of the debate.

"Safe Importation" is an oxymoron. It is impossible to achieve, and any politician claiming that importation can be safe knowingly speaks an untruth. The HHS report now gives them little room to wiggle and even fewer places to hide.

Released in mid-December, the report provides irrefutable evidence that banning what consumers believe are "Canadian" drugs protects Americans from harm. The report also dispels another vote-garnering argument proffered by pro-importation politicians by casting doubt that Canadian drugs are cheaper.

In analyzing the effects of legalizing importation from non-U.S. sources, a critical finding of the study echoes concerns of importation opponents that drugs purchased from "Canada" are often not, in fact, Canadian.

As many as 70% of Internet websites that have the appearance of being in Canada, aren't. They are not peddling U.S.-made drugs returned from Canada. Their drugs are produced in unsafe, unsanitary facilities in places such as India, the Dominican Republic and Pakistan. They are either minimally effective or outright counterfeits with no active ingredients.

And the American patient ordering from his computer has little chance of detecting that his drugs come from foreign manufacturers or criminal counterfeiters.

Demonstrating its own concerns, Health Canada refuses to vouch for the quality of drugs that flow through Canada to the U.S. Its position is that the country receiving foreign prescription drugs bears responsibility for the quality of those drugs. The Canadian Government echoes the concerns of its Health Department and goes even further, questioning whether or not to continue allowing Canadian pharmacies to export drugs to the U.S. at all.

Canadian officials recognize that the drug supply of some 30 million Canadians cannot possibly fill the needs of nearly 300 million Americans. It recognizes that this supply deficit is a gilded invitation for bad actors to ramp up counterfeit drug importation schemes.

The Canadian Health Minister, Ujjal Dosanjh, has repeatedly stated that Canada "cannot be the drugstore of the United States" and threatened to impose new regulations that would essentially bar the sales of actual Internet pharmacies by the end of January.

Legalizing importation would ensure that Americans take drugs from unknown sources for which nobody has taken responsibility. That, says the HHS report, is a prescription for disaster. "Many transactions," the report offers, "are occurring via poorly regulated and occasionally bogus Internet operations that have been documented ... to provide consumers with inferior products."

That prescription drugs from unverifiable sources are dangerous is no surprise. But few anticipated that the report would find that Canadian prescription drugs are not necessarily cheaper than their American counterparts.

"That most imported drugs are less expensive than American drugs is generally not true," the report states. It concluded that generic drugs, most widely used by Americans, are usually less expensive here in the U.S. and that lower prices can be found simply by shopping around or utilizing readily available prescription drug discount cards.

The study's authors contend that the enormous - and impossible - expense of screening imported drugs would more than offset any cost savings. "The public rightly expects that ... imported drugs [would] be safe and effective," they wrote. "Substantial resources would ... be needed to ensure adequate inspection of imported drug products."

The study raises yet another red flag for Americans seeking "Canadian" prescription drugs and confirms that there is no balance between safety and cost, no compromise appropriate. The U.S. has the safest drug supply in the world, and importing danger based on false cost concerns is simply not worth the risk.

HHS demonstrated once and for all that a Canadian drug cure-all is a hazardous myth. With such overwhelming evidence of the dangers inherent in legalizing importation, it is unconscionable that any politician would continue to play Russian roulette with the integrity of our medicine supply.

Kerri Houston is Vice President of Policy for Frontiers of Freedom and Executive Director of its Project for the American Healthcare Century.

Note -- The opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions, views, and/or philosophy of GOPUSA.

is a non-sequitur

Actually, no, an incidental comment, labeled as such as it was is not a non sequitur.

there are no pictures so none of us are in a position to even hazard a guess as to her current condition

A number of privileged FReepers have, in fact, seen Bearwash's wife. One of the advantages of Asian ancestry, present in most but not all cases, is a God-given preservation of youthful appearance well into the decades. Perhaps this is why she can walk into a preschool setting with our grandchildren and be mistaken for one of the young mothers.

This is only because these socialist countries will accept no other way and threaten our drug companies patents if they wont sell at the fixed price.

Actually, the only countries that have made this threat are not the ones we buy drugs from, but some small third-world countries that want cheap HIV drugs. It's not likely that any such countries have the manufacturing prowess to copy US drugs even if they wanted to.

At the same time, it's also true that the pharma companies are asking for illegal copying by getting special cushy patent terms passed just for their own benefit. We're seeing shenanigans like minor changes in formulation just before a patent expires, done just to extend the term another umpteen years. If you thought the controversy over kids downloading music was rough, just wait until countries like China and Korea start cloning drugs they get tired of waiting for. The more pharma insists on being the RIAA of the human body, the more common folk will be cheering when their products get cloned.

We have a serious problem with overregulation in our country that is contributing to the booming demand. But I do have to say that the one time I bought from a "Canadian" pharmacy, I was quite surprised that what I received actually came from Australia. I'm just relieved that it was at least first world and effective.

The GOP needs to get real though. They tell us that it is fine to bring in much of our food from countries where we would take great care as tourists in what we eat, and that it is perfectly fine to send our personal financial information off to countries like India. They just make themselves look bought and paid for by corporate interests.

It's ordinarily the case that when you see a "patent extension" that the formula or the process to make a substance very much like the drug you were familiar with is new.

Finally, you get your patent from the date you file. If it takes 15 years to get approval, then you have only 5 years or so to make any money.

You should take your complaint up with your Congresscritter and ask that the period of a patent BEGIN on or after the date a drug is approved for use.

I realize that most politicians are in the back pocket of someone - but do they need to be so damn obvious about it???

If they can be that obvious, it is obvious they don't have to worry about voter wrath. The sheeple will just re-elect them anyhow.

What about banning imported vegetables?

I wouldn't worry about those. You can wash them off if you're worried about such things as whether the Mexicans grow theirs in human waste, and so on.

We're seeing shenanigans like minor changes in formulation just before a patent expires, done just to extend the term another umpteen years.

Damn. That's slicker than X42! (And extremely unfair to people of modest means.)

Could you please provide your take on generics vs brand names.

Why do drug reps spend such an incredible amount on perks for Dr's? Is it for the sole purpose of expounding the merits of their particular drug or, does it have significant impact on whether a Dr prescribes a brand name over a generic?

At the end of the day, I would not mind this practice as long as Dr's had to disclose the cash value of perks provided by drug reps to their patients.
I think generics are wonderful. Most physicians I know do prescribe generics (or allow substitution on the script). Some meds are not yet available via prescription, and we often use the drug reps as info sources regarding them. I tend to try and keep up on the studies as well and usually give the reps some "homework" regarding real results.

In reply to some other posts here, sometimes the difference between drugs in the US and outside has to do with the delivery mechanism. For example, there are several common drugs that are XR or once-a-day drugs in the US. The "same" medication is ONLY available as a Q6h (every 6 hours) overseas.

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