Cory Booker Joins Senate Republicans to Kill Measure to Import Cheaper Medicine From Canada

[pnwmom]

26. What would really make more sense would be if we'd just regulate our prices

the way Canada does, instead of this re-importation idea. It's really kind of an odd idea -- trying to piggyback onto the much smaller Canadian system, instead of just regulating prices here.

Our market is so much bigger than theirs. Their system isn't made to start handling most of our drugs, too -- and who says the drug manufacturers would send them enough low cost supply to meet the needs of both Canada and the US?

Also, Canada regulates its own manufacturers well, but it doesn't do anything to regulate drugs that pass through Canada , to and from other countries. It's easy for the manufacturers of fake and adulterated drugs to set up a website or an address in Canada -- how would Americans be confident about what they were getting?

http://www.forbes.com/sites/gracemarieturner/2016/03/16/drug-importation-equals-unsafe-drugs-mr-trump/#52fdd78dbd3d

Canada, of course, imposes strict price controls on drugs, squeezing out the margin that finances research on new and better drugs. With a population one tenth the size of the United States, it stretches belief to think enough drugs could be imported from Canada to meet demand. U.S. companies wouldn’t ship 10 times as much product to Canada only to see it turn around and come back to the U.S. in the price-controlled packages.

Canada spent $29 billion on prescription drugs in 2014 compared to $374 billion in the U.S. With Canada’s market less than 8% the size of the U.S. market, it simply is not feasible to expect to run a significant part of the U.S. drug supply through Canada to have its price controls imposed, and then have the drugs shipped back to U.S. consumers. In addition, any savings would quickly be consumed by middlemen and distributors.

SNIP

Canadian health authorities have warned the United States that Health Canada will not take responsibility for the safety of drugs exported from Canada to the United States.

“If you think Internet drug sellers are safe because their Web sites display the Canadian flag, you’ve been fooled again,” says Lew Kontnik, co-author of the book Counterfeiting Exposed. “Canadian authorities do not inspect medicines that are transshipped through their country bound for U.S. consumers, which opens a huge loophole for counterfeiters to sell us fake medicines masquerading as Canadian prescription drugs.” These “Canadian” drugs are likely to be produced in India, Bangladesh, or Ghana.