Thursday, April 28, 2005
Two takes on drug importation
[Randy Scholfield, "Rx savings," The Wichita Eagle, 28 April 2005.
Robert Goldberg, "The 'European disease'," The Washington Times, 28 April 2005.
On the same day that Randy Scholfield had this to say about drug importation in The Eagle:
Kansans shouldn't fear the safety of Canadian drugs. But they should fear the influence of the pharmaceutical lobby in Washington, D.C.
Kansans consistently rank affordable prescription drugs as a top domestic issue. And many see drug imports as one way to cope with soaring costs.
Congress' refusal to approve imports is especially galling, considering its shameless pandering to the pharmaceutical industry in the 2004 Medicare prescription drug bill, which prohibited -- prohibited! --Medicare from negotiating with drug companies for discounts.
Gov. Kathleen Sebelius acted in the interests of Kansas consumers in joining the [I-SaveRx] program. It's not a long-term answer to soaring medical costs, but it is an honest attempt to revive a drug-addled Congress.
The Manhattan Institute's Center for Medical Progress director Robert Goldberg states the following in The Washington Times:
Last week, Congress held hearings on the Pharmaceutical Market Access and Drug Safety Act of 2005. This bill forces companies to sell, make and import their products from Canada and elsewhere, where government sets prices and access to medicines.
Forcing companies to basically ship their medicines overseas so they can be discounted and re-sold into America would destroy the global market for new medicines, as it has already done in Europe. Thanks to Europe's version of drug importation, it's biotech companies have no cash, their drug companies launch fewer new products than 10 years ago compared to America and biomedical research dollars have flowed to the United States.
Now, some of the European companies that moved here to escape price controls are already preparing to move again, to Asia, if Congress passes the act.
People wonder why companies don't charge Canada and Europe more. Even when faced with data that different drugs provide important benefits to specific groups of patients, governments in Europe or Canada or Australia use rationing and the threat of not paying for the drug altogether to keep prices low. In Australia, one of the countries that Congress wants to import from, patients taking Gleevec have to sign a contract promising they will go off the drug when the government wants them to. In England and Canada, some drugs that are standard therapy for treating Alzheimer's or lung cancer here are unavailable even after years of delay and price controls.
The coalition that has rallied around price controls likes to say, "A drug that is unaffordable is neither safe nor effective." But as the "European disease" has shown, price controls will not merely make medicines more "affordable." They will make them unavailable and undiscoverable.
Meanwhile, India and China are eager for Congress to impose price controls on our biotech and drug firms. They see them as a competitive advantage. India has 80 firms engaged in modern biotechnology, including protein engineering, molecular design and monoclonal antibodies. Investment in drug research has increased by 400 percent over the past five years because the Indian government has been strengthening patent protection, lifting price controls and allowing nascent drug companies to keep their profits without capital-gains taxes. Drug and biotech executives are hailed as heroes, not public enemies. India, along with Singapore, Korea and China, are giving this generation of "molecular Michaelangos," as we might call them, the wall that our own politicians are destroying.
[Matthew Hisrich, "Sebelius Is Practicing Black-Market Politics," The Wichita Eagle, 10 December 2004.]
[Randy Scholfield, "Rx savings," The Wichita Eagle, 28 April 2005.
Robert Goldberg, "The 'European disease'," The Washington Times, 28 April 2005.
On the same day that Randy Scholfield had this to say about drug importation in The Eagle:
Kansans shouldn't fear the safety of Canadian drugs. But they should fear the influence of the pharmaceutical lobby in Washington, D.C.
Kansans consistently rank affordable prescription drugs as a top domestic issue. And many see drug imports as one way to cope with soaring costs.
Congress' refusal to approve imports is especially galling, considering its shameless pandering to the pharmaceutical industry in the 2004 Medicare prescription drug bill, which prohibited -- prohibited! --Medicare from negotiating with drug companies for discounts.
Gov. Kathleen Sebelius acted in the interests of Kansas consumers in joining the [I-SaveRx] program. It's not a long-term answer to soaring medical costs, but it is an honest attempt to revive a drug-addled Congress.
The Manhattan Institute's Center for Medical Progress director Robert Goldberg states the following in The Washington Times:
Last week, Congress held hearings on the Pharmaceutical Market Access and Drug Safety Act of 2005. This bill forces companies to sell, make and import their products from Canada and elsewhere, where government sets prices and access to medicines.
Forcing companies to basically ship their medicines overseas so they can be discounted and re-sold into America would destroy the global market for new medicines, as it has already done in Europe. Thanks to Europe's version of drug importation, it's biotech companies have no cash, their drug companies launch fewer new products than 10 years ago compared to America and biomedical research dollars have flowed to the United States.
Now, some of the European companies that moved here to escape price controls are already preparing to move again, to Asia, if Congress passes the act.
People wonder why companies don't charge Canada and Europe more. Even when faced with data that different drugs provide important benefits to specific groups of patients, governments in Europe or Canada or Australia use rationing and the threat of not paying for the drug altogether to keep prices low. In Australia, one of the countries that Congress wants to import from, patients taking Gleevec have to sign a contract promising they will go off the drug when the government wants them to. In England and Canada, some drugs that are standard therapy for treating Alzheimer's or lung cancer here are unavailable even after years of delay and price controls.
The coalition that has rallied around price controls likes to say, "A drug that is unaffordable is neither safe nor effective." But as the "European disease" has shown, price controls will not merely make medicines more "affordable." They will make them unavailable and undiscoverable.
Meanwhile, India and China are eager for Congress to impose price controls on our biotech and drug firms. They see them as a competitive advantage. India has 80 firms engaged in modern biotechnology, including protein engineering, molecular design and monoclonal antibodies. Investment in drug research has increased by 400 percent over the past five years because the Indian government has been strengthening patent protection, lifting price controls and allowing nascent drug companies to keep their profits without capital-gains taxes. Drug and biotech executives are hailed as heroes, not public enemies. India, along with Singapore, Korea and China, are giving this generation of "molecular Michaelangos," as we might call them, the wall that our own politicians are destroying.
[Matthew Hisrich, "Sebelius Is Practicing Black-Market Politics," The Wichita Eagle, 10 December 2004.]
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