by Gabriel Levitt, President, PharmacyChecker.com and Prescription Justice | Jun 23, 2016 | FDA, Government, Online Pharmacies, Policy, Politics
“I represent safe and affordable imported medication. This bathwater is dangerous rogue pharmacy websites!”
Earlier this month, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration published a press release about Operation Pangea, an annual global initiative led by INTERPOL “to combat the unlawful sale and distribution of illegal and potentially counterfeit medical products on the internet.” This is the ninth annual operation, and each year I wonder if FDA will throw the baby out with the bathwater.
There are, according to FDA’s own sources, tens of thousands of drug-selling websites. Most of them are considered “rogue” by PharmacyChecker.com. Where the FDA and Operation Pangea successfully shut down sites (whether lawful or not) that intentionally sell counterfeit medications, or even online pharmacies that sell real medications but without the qualifications or pharmacy safety protocols to do so, we applaud their actions. Shutting down dangerous online pharmacies – throwing out the bathwater – is noble.
In February of last year we submitted a policy paper that I wrote to congressional committees with jurisdiction over laws and regulations that affect access to safe and affordable medications. Entitled “Online Pharmacies, Persona Drug Importation, and Public Health,” I argued that safe international online pharmacies are a boon to public health because they enable consumers to afford prescribed medications, and that overzealous enforcement of drug importation regulation could negatively affect access to those sites. Actions taken by FDA and through Operation Pangea would seem to cross the line from public health to Big Pharma profit protection where they curtail access to the safest international online pharmacies, which is throwing out the baby.
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Tagged with: Interpol, pangea
by Gabriel Levitt, President, PharmacyChecker.com and Prescription Justice | May 22, 2015 | Policy, Politics, Saving Money on Prescription Drugs
As you’ll discover below, the Obama administration’s policies to combat the manufacture and sale of counterfeit medications have a lot to do with furthering the agenda of the pharmaceutical industry in discouraging and curtailing online access by Americans to safe and affordable medication. Remember “The Deal” between the Obama administration and Big Pharma, in the form of the Pharmaceutical Researchers and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA), in which the Obama administration agreed to abandon supporting drug importation legal reform to lower drug prices for Americans if PhRMA would support Obamacare? I’ve always wondered how far that deal went.
This week, in our continuing quest to get the truth out and for our elected leaders in Congress to take bold action to protect online access to safe and affordable medication, we’re publishing the next section of our report called Online Pharmacies, Personal Drug Importation, and Public Health…
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Tagged with: Congress, CSIP, GoodRx, intellectual, Intellectual Property Enforcement Coordinator, IPEC, Obama Administration, rogue online pharmacies, safe online pharmacies, United States
by PharmacyChecker.com | May 15, 2015 | FDA, Online Pharmacies, Policy, Politics, Rogue Online Pharmacies
There are potentially tens of thousands of dangerous pharmacy websites, sometimes referred to as “rogue online pharmacies,” polluting the Internet and endangering the health of consumers worldwide. There are a much smaller group of safe domestic online pharmacies. Then there are an even smaller group of safe international online pharmacies, ones that we have verified, that sell many medications at much lower cost. However, when Americans purchase from these international online pharmacies (often because they can’t afford medication domestically) and import safe and effective medications, they are under most circumstances violating U.S. laws, which poses a quandary for regulators, public health officials, and even some people working over at Big Pharma. What’s right and wrong? How do we get rid of the rogues without overreaching and endangering public health by stopping Americans from obtaining safe medication internationally over the Internet?
In our continuing quest to get the truth out and for our elected leaders in Congress to take bold action to protect online access to safe and affordable medication, we’re publishing the next section of our report called Online Pharmacies, Personal Drug Importation, and Public Health…
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Tagged with: Bing, CanadaDrugs.com, CSIP, DNS locking, FDA, GAO, Google, LegitScript, NABP, Newpharm.net, Operation Pangea, rogue online pharmacy, rogue pharmacies
by Gabriel Levitt, President, PharmacyChecker.com and Prescription Justice | May 12, 2015 | Advocacy, Government, Online Pharmacies, Policy, Politics
Well, here we go again, another bill that would formally legalize a practice that has been going on for decades: Americans importing meds from Canadian pharmacies, at the very least to cut down on their drug bills, and in some cases even to afford life-saving medicines. Sorry to sound cynical, but I’ve seen these bills before and Big Pharma is always behind their failure – but what about this time?
The bill, H.R. 2228, was introduced by Representative Chellie Pingree (D-ME) barely a week ago and co-sponsored by Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA), and is entitled “Safe and Affordable Drugs from Canada Act of 2015.” It seems to mirror legislation in the Senate, S. 122, introduced by Sens. John McCain (R-NV) and Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), which has the same title.
The bills are focused on Canadian pharmacies only, not the wider landscape of international online pharmacies, which are often based in Canada: ones that millions of Americans have benefited from for over a decade. If H.R. 2228 passes, the FDA would be required to publish a list of approved Canadian pharmacies from which Americans could legally import, for personal use, non-controlled, non-biologic, and non-temperature sensitive, prescription medications. That would include the majority of maintenance prescription drugs that Americans are currently importing for personal use.
I support this bill 100%. Even though our program is open to safe and licensed pharmacies in other countries, not just ones in Canada and the U.S., the new bill moves the public policy and economic justice needle in the right direction. The practice of international pharmacy began with Americans crossing the border to buy lower cost medications in Canada and then, with the advent of the Internet, buying through mail order. Current law, technically, bans the practice and, unjustly, views it as a criminal act – even though no one has been prosecuted for it. The new bill in the House and Senate would lift the unethical ban on buying lower cost medications for their own use from Canada. Amen and Word Up to that!
So head on over to RxRights.org to contact your elected representatives and let them know you want them to vote for the Safe and Affordable Drugs from Canada Act of 2015!
Tagged with: affordable prescriptions, Big Pharma, Canadian pharmacies, H.R. 2228, House of Representatives, legalizing personal drug importation, personal drug importation, RxRights.org, S.122, Safe and Affordable Drugs from Canada Act of 2015, Senate, United States
by PharmacyChecker.com | Apr 16, 2015 | Online Pharmacies, Personal Drug Importation, Policy, Politics
What does the data actually show about the safety of buying medication online? Is it really dangerous to buy lower cost medication from a pharmacy in another country over the Internet? Do drug companies fund research in this area?
This week, in our continuing quest to get the truth out and for our elected leaders in Congress to take bold action to protect online access to safe and affordable medication, we’re publishing the next section of our report called Online Pharmacies, Personal Drug Importation, and Public Health… (more…)
by Gabriel Levitt, President, PharmacyChecker.com and Prescription Justice | Dec 30, 2014 | Advocacy, Drug Importation, Personal Drug Importation, Politics
The fight for access to safe and affordable medication will continue in 2015. As 2014 ends we find the price of medication continuing to escalate. AARP’s recent drug price report showed that brand name drug prices had increased by 13% in 2013, eight times the rate of inflation. The costs of generic drugs are going through the roof, some by astronomical amounts – to the tune of thousands of percent. Then of course 2014 brought us Sovaldi at $1000/pill, which is just the tip of the iceberg, as many more outrageously priced “specialty medications” are coming down the pipeline in 2015. New drugs that save lives and help people get better are great…but only if they are affordable.
In the holiday spirit, Senator Amy Klobuchar from Minnesota published a Christmas-themed op-ed last week called “How the Drug Companies Play Scrooge,” as in Ebenezer Scrooge, the greedy miser in Charles Dickens’ famous story A Christmas Carol. Klobuchar’s ghosts of Christmas past, present and future are, respectively, rampant drug price increases; the highest drug prices in the world by far; and the continuing assault on the pocketbooks of Americans by pharmaceutical companies unless Congress acts. Interestingly, Sen. Klobuchar’s metaphor compares Scrooge to Congress (not the pharmaceutical industry). She writes: “if Ebenezer Scrooge can be transformed from a crotchety, thoughtless, “bah humbug” miser to a generous steward of good will to all after only one night of ghostly visits, certainly there is hope for Congress.”
What can Congress do to end its Scrooge-like protection of big pharma? Sen. Klobuchar recommends three legislative solutions. Congress should pass legislation that would allow Medicare to negotiate drug prices with pharmaceutical companies under the same protocols permitted to the Department of Veterans Affairs. Currently, federal law actually bans such negotiations. Under one estimate, due to the VA’s ability to negotiate prices, drug prices are 40% lower when obtained through the VA than through Medicare.
Ending what Sen. Klobuchar calls “illegal pay-to-delay” deals between brand name and generic pharmaceutical companies, which postpone market availability of lower cost generic drugs, is another solution that can be addressed legislatively. Legislation introduced by Klobuchar and Sen. Charles Grassley would give the Federal Trade Commission more authority to stop those deals. Sen. Klobuchar asserts that the savings from ending pay-to-delay could be $4.7 billion for the U.S. budget and $3.5 billion for consumers.
Last but not least, Sen. Klobuchar recommends helping American consumers to personally import lower cost medication by passing The Safe and Affordable Drugs from Canada Act. This legislation, co-sponsored by Sen. John McCain from Arizona, would essentially codify the current practice of Americans buying lower cost medication from Canadian pharmacies. We support this bill but believe it needs to be expanded to include pharmacies in many other countries from which lower cost and safe medication can be and currently are obtained.
Congressional opponents of Klobuchar’s personal drug importation bill, the most vociferous among them surely raking in huge donations from big pharmaceutical companies, will argue that the Act will open the door to counterfeit drugs and rogue online pharmacies. The fact that counterfeit drugs and rogue online pharmacies exist, however, is not an argument against facilitating safe personal drug importation from verified international online pharmacies. Five million Americans already import medication for their own use. Consumers who purchase from safe international online pharmacies, such as those in the PharmacyChecker.com Verification Program, are able to save thousands of dollars a year. For many, personal importation of lower cost medication is the only option for obtaining needed prescription drugs.
While the FDA doesn’t prosecute Americans who import medications for their own use, federal law still holds that, under most circumstances, it is a crime!! It’s understandable that prescription drug importation meant for re-sale in U.S. pharmacies is regulated to that extent that those who violate the laws are subject to penalties. In contrast, people who need to import medication for their own use because they can’t afford the prices at U.S. pharmacies should not be subject to criminal enforcement of any kind, ever. So I hope that Senator Klobuchar and her colleagues, in addition to her recommendations identified above, introduce and pass a bill to amend federal law to decriminalize personal drug importation. By doing so Congress would bring prescription justice to Americans who are haunted by the scary ghosts, past, present and future, of the pharmaceutical industry.
Happy Holidays and New Year from PharmacyChecker.com!!
Tagged with: decriminalization, klobuchar, legislation
