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August
23, 2004
Governor Rod Blagojevich of Illinois announced that his administration
will set up an online clearing house for citizens of his state to order
prescription drugs from Canada, Ireland, and the United Kingdom. He doesn't
care if the federal government objects and, in fact, welcomes a lawsuit
where the high prices Americans are charged by the big pharmaceutical
houses are brought out in the open for discussion.
Speaker of the House, Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) claims that the Governor
can't guarantee the safety of these drugs and Blagojevich should be held
personally liable for any death or illness caused by these prescription
drugs from other countries.
The implications of the Speaker's comments are horrendous. Most of these
drugs are manufactured by American pharmaceutical houses, some with their
production facilities in places like Ireland. Does Mr. Hastert have some
sort of insider information showing that these supposedly reputable manufacturers
are dumping unsafe or inferior drugs in foreign countries? Is that what
makes them unsafe? Or is it that Mr. Hastert feels these other countries
are too dumb to know how to package, protect, store and ship these drugs,
another example of American hubris or supreme arrogance?
We've all heard this booga-booga scare story before. It's nothing new,
and it certainly isn't confined to the Speaker of the House.
The last time I wrote an article on the outrageous prices the pharmaceutical
houses charge Americans who need their products, supposedly under the
guise of having to cover their expensive costs in product research and
development, I received an email from one of their defenders. In that
note, he claimed that it costs the pharmaceutical industry over a billion
dollars to research, develop, and experiment with a new drug and another
billion to get it approved.
Having spent a good part of my life working in new product development
for some of the largest corporations in America, including General Electric,
General Motors, Kimberly-Clark and others, I can tell you flat out that
the idea of spending one thousand million dollars on research and development
for any product, except possibly space travel, is absolutely ridiculous.
To then go on and claim that it takes another billion to get FDA approval
is preposterous.
I've seen instances where the hard goods industry may spend thousands
to develop and test prototype products and then spend thousands more to
retool factories, but none of it would approach a billion dollars even
including the costs of advertising, marketing, and retail outlets. And
the pharmaceutical industry is dealing with chemicals and crucibles, maybe
the costs of special rabbits, rats, and monkeys to test. Even if they
spent a fortune on brain power, it still wouldn't make sense.
The one tremendous cost that the pharmaceutical industry does have is
for lobbyists in Washington where they have more than one lobbyist for
every member of the Senate and House of Representatives to protect themselves
from regulation. How much do you suppose Dennis Hastert received for his
scare story condemnation and for not doing his job in regulating a runaway
industry?
Editor's
note: The only thing that could guarantee honest competitive price and
quality is the free market. As long as government is involved we will
have to put up with all this nonsense and high prices - no matter where
things come from. The most interesting thing to watch for in this particular
situation is how fast it takes ALL of the major manufacturers to move
out of the U.S.
Until
the people of this country take honest steps to shut down government involvement
in everything that is outside of their constitutional mandate, we will
continue to suffer from the sweetheart relationship of government with
big business. The only thing to keep in mind is that Pfizer doesn't cluster
bomb their potential customers or use tanks to knock down their detractors.
Their government buddies are more than happy to do so.
You
can't expect government to effectively legislate low prices. Most people
take far too much medicine as it is, both prescription and over the counter.
Vote with your wallet. If enough people found alternate and healthy lifestyle
answers to their medication uses, the major pharmaceutical companies would
soon be hurting big time and begging for mercy. As long as people can
blackmail the taxpayers into paying for all of their pills, the drug companies
will remain fat and sassy.
Anybody
want some clues how to cut down their use of Rx and OTC drugs? Write
to me.
Visit Ed Henry's own web site!
Send a
message to your elected representatives. Click
here to start. Be
sure to send a copy to Ed Henry.
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