PharmacyChecker has proudly announced a new online pharmacy verification tool to make it easier for consumers to determine if a website is safe and accredited through the PharmacyChecker Verification Program. This verification portal can benefit patients, health care providers and caregivers considering lower-cost retail pharmacy options in Canada and other countries.

As we emphasized in our press release about the new portal, pharma-funded initiatives, like the
“.Pharmacy Program” of the National Association of Boards of Pharmacy (NABP), do not help Americans seeking lower-cost and safe medicine from Canada and other countries. The NABP advises Americans not to buy and import medication. The stated intent of the NABP’s “.Pharmacy Program” is to help consumers find “legitimate” online pharmacies, which are ones that have registered a “.pharmacy” domain (e.g., Walgreens.pharmacy, Kroger.pharmacy, Walmart.pharmacy). Such household name U.S. online pharmacies are usually ones approved in the NABP’s Verified Internet Pharmacy Practice Sites (VIPPS) program.

Unfortunately, the NABP’s initiative might confuse consumers about online pharmacy safety and affordability. That’s because non-U.S. online pharmacies, ones that charge much lower prices for the same brand name drugs sold at U.S. pharmacies, and sell to patients in the U.S., regardless of their safety, cannot obtain a .Pharmacy registration.

So, consumers could find a safe and affordable international online pharmacy but believe it’s not safe because its website does not load with a “.pharmacy” domain name. Because the NABP’s “legitimate” U.S. pharmacy sites are too expensive, the consumer may end up unable to fill their prescription. It’s not rare: tens of millions of Americans don’t fill prescriptions each year because of high drug prices.

Now consumers can use the PharmacyChecker Verification Portal to check an online pharmacy that may be safe and reliable but not eligible for “.Pharmacy.” One great point that the NABP makes is that having “.Pharmacy” diminishes the problem of fake verification logos. Rogue sites sometimes publish unauthorized and fake NABP VIPPS and PharmacyChecker logos. With the “.Pharmacy” registration, a consumer knows the site is NABP-approved. Up until July 2019, consumers clicked the PharmacyChecker seal to ensure it was hosted on the www.pharmacychecker.com website. Now, they can also check websites’ legitimacy by using the Verification Portal.

We don’t discount the future benefits of a “.Pharmacy” program, where all safe online pharmacies are welcome, including ones that the drug companies don’t like. We’re not there yet.

NABP-approved pharmacy sites are too expensive for so many. Folks need an alternative to this pharmaceutical industry-funded program.

For those who need the international pharmacy option, Americans can count on PharmacyChecker.com.