Campaigns to Block New Direction for Pharmaceutical SectorGlobal pharma is attacking public opinion for a new direction for the sector to serve the people through self-reliance and public enterprise under the control of a public authority that the people can trust and hold to account. Global pharma attempts to divert discussion to the market prices paid for drugs and the introduction or not of a public-private pharmacare system, which would guarantee an expanded demand and payment for its commodities.
National Newswatch recently carried an article entitled "Exempting COVID medicines from new price controls: Ottawa hypocrisy," by Nigel Rawson and John Adams.[1] The item reads, "The federal government intends to drastically transform the rules of its tribunal that sets ceiling prices for new drugs and vaccines in Canada in January. [...] Key elements of the government's plan have been strongly criticized by patients, drug developers and analysts since it was first announced in 2017. Concerns have increased during the COVID-19 pandemic. Months before implementation, the plan has already blocked access to new important medicines for Canadian patients." The authors focus attention on the government tribunal and the issue of drug prices and the effect this may have on the production, availability and supply of pharmaceuticals. They raise problems of "access to new important medicines" from the point of view of the market for drugs that global pharma produces not from the point of view of opening a new direction and aim for the sector that serves the people and their right to health care. The article insists, "Case studies have shown that the new rules can require manufacturers to reduce prices to unsustainable levels. Most importantly, clinical trials funded by drug developers and the number of new drugs approved in Canada have decreased dramatically." Alarm is sounded and people are encouraged either to jump to the defence of global pharma or insist that the tribunal and price controls are the way to go. The article continues in this vein, assessing as "hypocrisy" the government's proposal to allow global pharma to dictate prices for pandemic drugs but not other medicines: "However, on September 17, Ottawa announced a special policy to decrease the same tribunal's scrutiny of COVID-19 vaccines and medicines, such as remdesivir, as part of a 'government-wide effort to provisionally ease the regulatory pathway' for COVID-19 therapeutics. "Manufacturers will be able to provide these products at their own list prices unless the pricing tribunal receives a complaint from any federal or provincial minister of health. It is good that Ottawa has started to appreciate that elements of the pricing revisions are a heavy regulatory burden on drug developers and a barrier to meeting patients' needs." The authors appear delighted global pharma will be able to make a killing on selling COVID-19 vaccines and medicines. The pandemic highlights how Canada is captive to global pharma and the necessity for a new direction of self-reliance and public enterprise in the pharmaceutical sector. The article pleads global pharma's case for an end to price controls on all drugs saying, "Canada is presently a commercially viable market for new medicines and vaccines, despite the barriers created by federal and provincial governments that limit, delay or deny access to new drugs, especially costly ones. "However, the new federal price controls will prevent many new medicines from coming to Canada at all. Canadians with rare disorders will be particularly impacted."
The article gives an example of a global drug cartel refusing to sell a new drug called Trikafta in Canada because of "uncertainty around the new pricing rules." This use of specific cases is meant to emotionally blackmail Canadians into bowing to global pharma's terms and acceptance of its dominance, similar to the way big business charities browbeat people emotionally into donating money rather than facing problems squarely and solving them with a new direction. For Trikafta and other new drugs, according to the authors, global pharma apparently is "taking a wait-and-see approach. Since the regulations were finalized in August 2019, a growing list of medicines have been approved in the United States but not submitted to Health Canada for evaluation." The authors accuse the Trudeau government of adding "red tape that will decrease Canada's attractiveness as a place to perform research and launch new medicines that will reduce Canadians' suffering and extend lives." Canadians should denounce this argument and direction, and accuse global pharma of blocking and destroying the development of self-reliant Canadian research and independent production and availability of medicines and growth of scientific expertise through public enterprise. The item concludes, "The pandemic has again demonstrated that our health care system is a limited and fragile resource. Drugs contribute to the sustainability of the health system and to patients' lives. The federal government should recognize the value of other innovative life-changing medicines and implement rational policies that allow Canadians to benefit from these technological advances and that promote research and development in Canada. To do otherwise is hypocritical." Our "health care system is a limited and fragile resource" precisely because of its control by the private interests of global pharma that compete to dominate the sector, make maximum profit from it and block independent Canadian development. To break away from health care's "limited and fragile" state requires a new direction under the control of the people with an aim to guarantee health care as a right for all and not as a right for a few to make maximum profit. Note1. Authors Nigel Rawson and John Adams claim affiliation with the Canadian Health Policy Institute and Best Medicines Coalition Canadian Health Policy Institute writes in its website that it is "focussed on health economics and policy issues affecting patient access to innovative medical goods and services and the cost-related issues of sustainability and value for money for taxpayers." Best Medicines Coalition says its goal is "Drug programs which deliver high standards of equitable and consistent access to medications for all Canadians." These goals
and mission statements are consistent with the aim of global pharma for
maximum profit from selling drugs and its continued control of the
pharmaceutical sector. (Photos: TML)
This article was published in Article Link:   Website: www.cpcml.ca Email: editor@cpcml.ca |
The issue facing
the sector is not the price of drugs global pharma charges or how
Canadians should pay for them. The issue is global pharma's private
control of the pharmaceutical sector and aim of maximum private profit,
and the necessity for a new direction of self-reliance and public
enterprise under the control of the people with the aim to guarantee
the right of all to health care.
The authors
entice Canadians into complaining over the "red tape and price
controls" global pharma faces, which may restrict patients' access to
new drugs or on the contrary perhaps side with the government's
position that the tribunal and price controls are necessary measures.
This diverts Canadians from thinking about, discussing, planning for,
and embarking on a new pro-social direction for the sector outside the
clutches of global pharma altogether.