President Trump’s promise to make the American people “buy low-cost prescription drugs” FAILED.
On November 30, local time, the policy of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the United States Department of Health and Human Services to allow the import of low-cost prescription drugs from Canada will officially take effect.
However, on the 28th, Canada announced that it had banned the mass export of some prescription drugs from the 27th, citing that the U.S. policy would cause a shortage of drugs in the country.!
Reuters reported on the 29th that lowering the price of prescription drugs has always been one of the key issues in American politics, especially during the COVID-19 epidemic, Trump and President-designate Biden have made similar commitments.
Unexpectedly, not only Canada directly admitted that love could not help, but also American pharmaceutical companies expressed dissatisfaction.
According to the report, Canadian Health Minister Patti Haydu said in a statement on the 28th that drug shortages are still a global challenge, and the COVID-19 epidemic has exacerbated the phenomenon. If certain drugs originally provided for the Canadian market are sold abroad, which may cause or aggravate the shortage of domestic drugs, the Canadian government will prohibit the sale of the drug abroad.
In the statement, she also asked these pharmaceutical companies to provide information to assess existing or potential drug shortages. If there is a serious or imminent safety risk, the pharmaceutical company should provide this information within 24 hours.
The statement also mentioned that in the early stage of the COVID-19 outbreak, the Canadian government issued two interim orders allowing the increase in the import and sale of drugs related to treat COVID-19.
Canada is finally Rejected once !
The latest regulation is in response to the “Prescription Drug Import Regulations” of the United States, which entered into force on the 30th, which allows licensed pharmacists or wholesalers in the United States to Prescription drugs are imported in batches in the Canadian market.
“Our healthcare system is a symbol of national identity, and we are committed to defending it, and actions taken today will help protect Canadians from accessing the medicines they rely on.” Haidu said that Canada is still a small market for drug sales, accounting for only about 2% of the world, of which 68% rely on imports, while the United States accounts for 44% of the global market.
Therefore, Canada needs to be “vigilant” in maintaining the supply of drugs. According to Health Canada, since 2017, about 44% of drugs on the Canadian market have “have at least one shortage”, and the spread of the novel coronavirus epidemic has made the shortage worse. Canadian Prime Minister Trudeau said in September that he was willing to supply medicines to other countries if possible, but the first priority was to ensure the needs of Canadians.
According to the Associated Press on the 29th, some experts in the United States doubt the feasibility of importing prescription drugs from Canada, partly because they are worried that Canadian suppliers are unable to meet the huge market demand in the United States. In addition, the American Association of Drug Research and Pharmaceutical Manufacturers (PhRMA) believes that the plan may expose patients to the risk of buying fake drugs. At least three industry associations have sued the Trump administration.
Stansel, executive vice president of PhRMA, said that under federal law, foreign drugs must meet both safety and low cost requirements for sale in the U.S. market, but each previous U.S. government has refused to import drugs for one of the reasons. Greenwood, head of the American Biotechnology Innovation Organization, said that according to the assessment of non-partisan budget experts, imported prescription drugs do not really save money. “The plan is nothing more than an empty gesture by politicians”.
As early as last July, Trump ordered a plan to allow the import of prescription drugs from Canada at a lower price. At the time, U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Aza said that he and Trump discussed “develoting a plan on how to safely and effectively import drugs from Canada” so that “drug sellers can enter into deals with other countries for the benefit of the American people”.
In July this year, Trump signed an executive order allowing the United States to import low-cost prescription drugs from countries, including Canada. However, at that time, Trump’s plan encountered a lot of resistance. The move, PhRMA said in a statement, “is a reckless distraction that hinders our ability to respond to the current COVID-19 epidemic”.
The anger of American pharmaceutical manufacturers is not unreasonable. According to the New York Times on the 29th, the just past Thanksgiving and Black Friday shopping season triggered a new peak of virus transmission in the United States, with the average daily death toll approaching its highest since April.
On the 28th, the number of new confirmed cases and 1,189 deaths in the United States exceeded 155,000, which was the 26th consecutive day that the number of new confirmed cases in the United States exceeded 100,000. In November, 44 states broke the weekly record for confirmed cases, and 25 states broke the weekly death record.
As of Saturday, the number of more than 4 million new confirmed cases in the United States was more than twice that of October (1.9 million). Ingesby, director of the Johns Hopkins University Center for Health Security, said that by With the increase of people going out during the holiday, it is expected that the number of cases will increase faster in the future.
“The United States is about to face the disaster.” CNN said on the 29th that the number of hospitalizations for COVID-19 in the United States continued to rise on the 28th, reaching a record 91,635, and the hospital’s equipment and manpower were significantly stretched.
Wen Linyan, an emergency physician at the Milken Institute of George Washington University, said that the number of COVID-19 deaths in the United States may double in a single day, and people need to be prepared for the upcoming “severe cold”.
CNN said that members of Congress who have just finished Thanksgiving leave will decide whether the vaccine produced by Pfizer can be urgently authorized by the FDA and how the vaccine can be distributed reasonably among the states in the next few weeks.
However, due to the great differences in geography, climate, environment and the level of medical personnel from state, there are still great obstacles to vaccine transportation and vaccination.
