WASHINGTON — Senator Chuck Grassley today joined in proposing a bipartisan amendment that would make it legal for U.S. consumers to buy safe prescription drugs from other countries.
“I’ve always considered this a free-trade issue,” Grassley said. “Imports create competition and keep domestic industry more responsive to consumers. If Americans could legally access prescription drugs outside the United States, then drug companies would be forced to re-evaluate their pricing strategy. The pharmaceutical industry would no longer have free rein to force American consumers to pay more than their fair share of the high cost of research and development.”
The Pharmaceutical Market Access and Drug Safety Act was filed as an amendment to the health care bill under consideration by the U.S. Senate.
Grassley sponsored the drug reimportation legislation with Senators Byron Dorgan, Olympia Snowe and John McCain. The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office estimates that the legislation would save $19.4 billion over the next 10 years. The legislation contains safeguards to prohibit counterfeit drugs from entering the system or other practices that would put the consumer at risk, and applies only to FDA-approved prescription drugs produced in FDA-approved plants from countries with comparable safety standards.
Grassley said the amendment is part of a long-haul fight to make it legal for Americans to import their prescription drugs. He has voted for every amendment that’s come before the Senate to allow prescription drugs to be imported. The first was in 2000. In 2004, Grassley sponsored his own comprehensive reimportation proposal (S.2307). In 2005, he combined that measure with a proposal sponsored by Dorgan and Snowe (S.334). In 2007 (S.242) and again this year (S.525), Grassley, Dorgan, Snowe and McCain introduced the Pharmaceutical Market Access and Drug Safety Act.
Grassley also has worked in other ways to expand access to prescription drugs for Americans. In October, the Senate Judiciary Committee passed bipartisan legislation he sponsored with Senator Herb Kohl to prohibit brand-name and generic pharmaceutical manufacturers from entering into anti-competitive settlements that keep cheaper drugs off the market. Grassley said the Preserve Access to Affordable Generics Act (S.369) responds to pay-for-delay deals that impede generic drug competition and keep drug costs high for Americans. In 2003, Grassley sponsored legislation that created the Medicare prescription drug benefit and included an extensive program to help low-income Americans access prescription medicines with little or no cost.
In addition, Grassley has conducted oversight of the Food and Drug Administration’s system for inspecting drugs and ingredients for pharmaceuticals that are manufactured in other countries. This year and last year, he introduced the Drug and Device Accountability Act with the late Senator Ted Kennedy to give the Food and Drug Administration more resources to inspect domestic and foreign-made prescription drugs and medical devices. Their legislation would augment the agency’s resources through the collection of new inspection fees; expand the FDA’s authority, including new subpoena powers, for ensuring the safety of drugs and medical devices made domestically and in other countries; and require certification of applications for drugs and devices needing FDA approval and establish civil and criminal penalties for false or misleading certifications.
Experts say consumers in the U.S. pay 60 to 112 percent more for brand-name prescription drugs than consumers in other countries.