BU Bid to Allow Drug Imports Likely Doomed

By: Patricia Barry | Source: AARP Bulletin Today | May 10, 2007

Bipartisan legislation sponsored by Sens. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., and Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, to legalize buying lower-cost prescription drugs from Canada and other Western countries was passed by the Senate Monday, May 7—but in effect was doomed when an amendment proposed by Sen. Thad Cochran (R-Miss.) and backed by the drug industry also was passed.

The Dorgan-Snowe bill, supported by many consumer groups, including AARP, had gained considerable backing in the Senate because it included several safeguards—such as mandatory inspections of foreign pharmacies and U.S. importers, "track-and-trace" packaging to foil counterfeiting, and steps to ensure the drugs were made in an approved facility.

The Cochran amendment requires the secretary of Health and Human Services to "certify" that imported drugs are safe and cost less, a change Dorgan described as "a poison pill."

Similar language effectively blocked the implementation of previous bills to legalize drug importation that were passed in the Clinton and early Bush administrations. "The secretary can't certify there is no risk with any new drug," Dorgan said. "He couldn't certify there is no risk with spinach coming from Mexico or strawberries from any other country."

Prior to final passage, Dorgan and Snowe got a related amendment passed that would require the use of anticounterfeiting safeguards in the U.S. drug supply.