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U.S. Cross-Border Prescription Drug Consumers Happily Sucking Canadians Dry |
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Written by D.L. McCracken
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Friday, 17 February 2006 |
The Fraser Institute, a prestigious Canadian thinktank on government and social policy, released the findings of an in-depth study on the effects of cross-border prescription drug shopping. In the paper titled, "Price Controls, Patents and Cross-Border Internet Pharmacies: Risks to Canada's Drug Supply and International Trading Relations" the director of Health and Pharmaceutical Policy Research and Insurance Policy, Brett J. Skinner is warning of dire consequences to the Canadian prescription drug consumer if changes are not implemented to protect our supply.
At the individual level, some Canadian prescription drug consumers are being told by their pharmacists that the medication they require is not available and the manufacturer will not commit to an estimated time of arrival thus forcing the patient to take a substitute medication which may or may not work but will always come with excessive and sometimes debilitating side effects.
The fact is that the U.S. has in excess of 295 million people...Canada has a measly 33 million. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out how quickly any supply will disappear if even a portion of the American population insists upon using Canada as their personal drug store.
The Fraser report says, "If the estimated potential individual and bulk demand for
cross-border drugs from the United States is totalled, it becomes apparent that the number of American consumers that might compete for access to the Canadian drug supply
is nearly four times the size of Canada’s entire population".
Some might ask why the U.S. legislators aren't doing more to prevent their citizens from crossing the border just to buy medications. Afterall, U.S. lawmakers are constantly issuing warnings that certain medications purchased in Canada "may not be safe" because they were never approved by the American Food and Drug Administration (FDA). And that's about as far as the lawmakers go to stop the cross-border practice.
At this time and since at least 2003 various U.S. legislative bodies from the county/civic level as far up as the federal Congressional level are actually passing laws that not only allow their citizens to cross-border shop for prescription drugs, some government levels are actually facilitating American consumer's trips to Canada! American lawmakers call these programs, "Reimportation" which is simply a fancy way of saying that they are "sucking the Canadians dry".
State lawmakers are also in discussions to allow the "reimportation" of bulk Canadian drugs to benefit "public employees and those enrolled in public health insurance programs like Medicaid and Medicare" according to the Fraser report. From Anchorage, Alaska to Washington DC, officials are moving forward with proposals to import prescription drugs from Canada for city employees and private citizens.
Various American communities will go so far as to arrange bus tours for the purpose of stocking up on medication supply. They offer a fun 2 or 3 day excursion to Canada and when they arrive home they have enough meds to last them for at least 3 months. In the state of Michigan in 2004, American seniors were offered free bus trips to Canada. The name on the bus? The RxExpress.
The Fraser report estimates that as of 2005 there were approxiametly 278 Canadian Internet Pharmacies in operation raking in $507 million in prescription drug sales to Americans. Internet Pharmacies of course allow American prescription drug consumers to purchase Canadian drugs from the comfort of their own livingroom. Internet pharmacies promise to ship medication orders directly to the consumer's doorstep for about $14 in shipping charges. Many Internet pharmacies offer referral incentives to their customers including money off a future order or free delivery if an existing customer refers a friend.
The American lawmakers and individual American prescription drug consumers know the individual implications of buying up Canadian prescription drugs - they know that Canadians will suffer shortages and outright unavailability of their own prescribed meds [b]and they don't care.[/b]
Something needs to be done to protect our prescription drug supply. If it includes deregulation, than so be it. The Fraser report recommends that Canadian federal drug price regulations be repealed. It might hurt initially but at the end of the day we Canadians will be assured that when our scripts are ready for refill, they will be available.
Consider this - as it is right now, Americans can buy whatever they want from Canadian pharmacies and Internet Pharmacies right down to pet medication and over the counter (OTC) supplies. If Canada does not address this situation soon, what is going to happen when the world finds itself in the middle of the next pandemic - human-to-human transmission of the avian flu? Yes both countries, the U.S. and Canada have been assuring their citizens that they have been able to stockpile the only medication in existence that might treat avian flu and that drug is Tamiflu. It's not a cure but it's all we have at this time.
Both countries have said that they have been able to stockpile acceptable amounts of Tamiflu but as with any drug stockpile, there will never be enough to treat every single person. So suddenly that nation of 295 million potential avian flu victims begin to buy up as much Tamiflu as they can get their hands on from a nation of 33 million. Again it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out the end result.
Taking the pandemic scenario one step further, image the pandemonium if several months into the emergency, Canadian researchers happen to discover the vaccine first. It is not outside the realm of possibility that Canadians would die because Americans were able to buy the vaccine first from an Internet pharmacy.
This writer feels the need to reiterate one specific point - continued cross-border prescription medication shopping by American consumers is resulting in shortages and back orders for some Canadians right now. In other words, some of us are being forced to do without so that our American counterparts can be adequately supplied. And yet knowing this, American lawmakers continue to push for more legislation to enable more American consumers to legally purchase more Canadian medications.
Why do the Americans not care?
D.L. McCracken can be reached at
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