DeLauro, Bipartisan Group Calls for End to Trade Provisions That Prevent Prescription Drug Importation
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Thursday July 28, 2005
DeLauro, Bipartisan Group Calls for End to Trade Provisions That Prevent Prescription Drug Importation
WASHINGTON, D.C. - Congresswoman Rosa L. DeLauro (Conn.-3) today joined U.S. Senators David Vitter (R-LA), Deborah Stabenow (D-MI), and Congresswoman Anne Northup (R-KY) to introduce bipartisan legislation that calls for an end to U.S. trade provisions that prevent prescription drug importation. Previous trade agreements with Singapore, Morocco and Australia have included prescription drug patent language, which insulates drug companies from allowing importation.
"This legislation ensures that consumers will be at the negotiating table of these trade agreements, as pharmaceutical representatives have been for years," said DeLauro. "This bill means that pharmaceutical companies can no longer seek cover in trade agreements for pricing schemes that are unfair to American consumers."
U.S. pharmaceutical companies keep drug prices high through laws - and now trade agreements - that prevent Americans from importing FDA-approved prescription drugs. Consequently, American patients bear the cost of research and development of new, lifesaving drugs for the entire world, but not the benefit of receiving them at a fair price.
Costs for the most frequently used drugs are rising at a rate nearly three-and-a-half times that of inflation. With almost 1 in 3 seniors unable to afford to purchase the medicines their doctors prescribe, seniors and those with chronic medical conditions have been traveling to countries like Canada for years because they know they can get these drugs there at half or even a third of the cost.
In July of 2003, the U.S House voted to allow reimportation of FDA-approved drugs from countries like Canada.
"These provisions are being slipped into trade agreements because drug companies know that the importation of safe, FDA-approved prescription drugs is coming," said DeLauro. "This practice is rigging the system to benefit pharmaceutical companies at the expense of everyone else. It must end."
The "Protecting Free Trade in Pharmaceuticals Act of 2005" amends the bipartisan Trade Promotion Authority Act of 2002. A related amendment was inserted into the Fiscal Year 2006 Science State, Justice and Commerce Appropriations Bill.
http://www.house.gov/delauro/press/2005/July/rx_drugs_07_28_05.html