Open up NHS to our drug firms, White House demands

[cal04]

The White House is lobbying British ministers to allow the world's main drug companies unrestricted access to the NHS as part of a package of free market reforms for the service. The US government is positioning itself behind the giant pharmaceutical firms, predominantly based in America, which have been piling pressure on the body that approves drugs for use in hospitals and for prescription by GPs.

The drug companies claim that they are being held back by the National Institute for Clinical Excellence and have separately lobbied for it to be reformed.

In a surprising intervention, the US deputy health secretary, Alex Azar, forced the issue in London yesterday, ahead of talks with officials following a trip to the US last week by the health secretary, Patricia Hewitt. He said attempts to use rationing mechanisms such as Nice to cut soaring drugs bills would stifle innovation - an argument that is constantly made by the pharmaceutical industry.

Allowing all new drugs to be used in the NHS would result in the companies "fighting it out" on price, Mr Azar said, which would drive the drug bill down.

http://society.guardian.co.uk/health/story/0,,1947280,00.html

[Mythsaje]

1. "That way our drug-dealing friends could kill MILLIONS

before anyone realized what was going on! With any luck, they'd all be BROWN people."

Excuse me if I'm a little skeptical about their argument.

[nxylas]

2. If the White House says jump...

...I bet Blair asks "How high?"

[pokercat999]

7. When the WH says jump the top of Blairs' head hits the

bottom of Bush's desk.

[saigon68]

10. Nah he just "LICKS HIS MASTER'S HAND"

OR ANOTHER PART OF HIS MASTER'S ANATOMY

[OneBlueSky]

3. the pharmaceutical industry is part-owner of the Bush administration . . .

along with the oil industry, the banking and credit card industry, the agricultural industry, and several others . . . when they say "Jump!", BushCo asks "How high?" . . .

the single most critical issue facing this nation, imo, is corporate control of the government . . . when corporations and their lobbyists actually write the legislation "regulating" their industries, you know the balance is totally out of whack and must be corrected . . .

[Lydia Leftcoast]

4. I'm beginning to adopt the opinion that "free market" and "reforms" do

not belong in the same sentence.

Increasingly, "free market reforms" means "freedom for corporations to screw ordinary people."

[rodeodance]

6. you got it right on!

[Joe Chi Minh]

11. What should make the so-called "free trade" imposed by the

far right in the US, particularly unpalatable, is that you, the United States, are more than large and wealthy enough to be an economic block in your own right.

In fact, I believe, it was to counter that extraordinary economic clout that the European Union was founded; a uniting of the states in Europe.

Protectionism is only a dirty to word to the economic cannibals whose depredations necessitate such protection for the country's honest citizens. It's about patriotism. Not flag-waving. Patriotism.


An enlightened Democratic leadeship could gradually make a Pan American union, which of course would be massive. An economic Union serving the common weal, not just a corporate elite; then gradually, as the countries in South America are assisted, and they reach a level of affluence equal to that of the American people as a whole, incorporated into an ever larger union.

[rodeodance]

5. so bush wants the Brits to fight it out---but not Medicare Part D!!

[intaglio]

8. This explains something that has been bugging me

The Murdock wing of our press has been pushing many stories defamatory of NICE. These are always of the sort "The NHS does not allow me to have a drug that might cure my cancer/genetic illness/auto-immune disease". The drugs in question are of limmited efficacy and are very expensive. The same media sources also decry the NHS as being too expensive, of course.

Now I know why these stories are pushed

[Lydia Leftcoast]

9. Yes, I saw stories like that in The Times when I was in England

It all makes sense.

[Cleita]

12. Big PHARMA needs to be kicked in the butt. It's not enough

that they have profited with prescription drug reform in this country at the expense of taxpayers and senior citizens, now they are trying to destroy the infrastructure of NHC in other countries. It's time to stop this culture of corporate welfare in our country. In a true free market society prices are always haggled over and negotiated for just like in Canada and other countries.

I could see in instances of rare drugs for rare disorders, that there would be government subsidies for them. However, that doesn't happen today anyway. They won't manufacture many life saving drugs that aren't profitable for them, because they are for rare diseases, but still feel free to pick the pockets of our Medical programs for maximum proft.

[yellowcanine]

13. So it is all right for the British NHS to bargain with drug companies but not Medicare and

Medicaid. Someone explain that to me please. Sounds as if U.S. taxpayers are going to be subsidizing low cost drugs for British citizens. Do I have that wrong? I never was very good at macroeconomics.

[intaglio]

14. Nah, no subsidy just more profit$ for the drug cartels

n/t

[Nihil]

15. Yep, you have that wrong.

> Sounds as if U.S. taxpayers are going to be subsidizing low cost
> drugs for British citizens.

No. It is an attempt to break down the barriers to crap/dangerous
untested drugs that are currently foisted on the third world (and
parts of America) by Big Pharma. U.S. taxpayers don't subsidise
anything on this side of the pond (with the possible exception of
the war machine, depending on which bits you look at and whose tale
you believe). You can fight for your own National Health System
without any fear that your money will go to help UK taxpayers!

:-)