Nov. 4 - The Ontario Pharmacists' Association (OPA) sponsored and hosted an event at the National Press Club today where the University of Texas' Dr. Marv Shepherd, an expert on the importation of drugs, spoke to a Canadian audience about the negative impact of drug exports to the U.S. and the effect this will have on the Canadian drug supply.

The OPA believes that prescription drugs are a highly political issue in the U.S. because of high prices in that country and the growing number of cases of Americans coming across the border into Canada for treatment or to buy drugs.

In his address to the National Press Club, Dr. Shepherd unveiled the updated findings of his Drug Importation Analysis. He emphasized the notion that Canadians need to be aware of the continuing threat by Americans to their pharmaceutical supply. Currently, close to a billion dollars of drug products left Canada via the Canadian pharmacy Internet firms to U.S. homes.

"The demand for the legalization of drug importation in the U.S. has not subsided and if commercial and personal drug importation were to become legal in the U.S. Canada needs to be prepared," said Dr. Marv Shepherd, Ph.D., Director for the Centre for Pharmacoeconomic Studies, College of Pharmacy, The University of Texas at Austin. "The Canadian drug supply would be exhausted in less than 50 days by the American demand."

The OPA has been voicing concerns for the past two years about the detrimental impact of the spread of cross-border trade in prescription drugs, and more specifically drug re-importation into the United States via Internet pharmacies.

"This is a complex issue with potential price parity implications, significant risk to the Canadian supply of prescription drugs, and patient safety due to the unregulated Internet pharmacy trade," said Marc Kealey, CEO of the Ontario Pharmacists' Association. "Our message to the government of Canada is to move quickly to ban all exports of prescription drugs. This will in effect resolve these potential risks and help restore confidence in the Canadian supply of prescription drugs for Canadian patients."

One of the biggest problems associated with importation is people never know exactly where the drugs are coming from. There may be no guarantee that imported drugs are safe.

"A country with 32 million citizens should not be supplying the prescription needs of a country with 280 million," said Kealey. "Raiding Canada's medicine cabinet will not solve health care problems in the U.S."

This has been the ongoing message that OPA has voiced across the country and in several states in the United States, including Texas, Maine, Florida, Rhode Island, Michigan, Illinois, Nevada and Vermont. The OPA is working closely with its national organization, CPhA, several provincial advocacy organizations and other stakeholder groups.