Order Issued in Independent Pharmacists Case - 10/25/04

US District Court Judge Virginia Hopkins issued and order in favor of the plaintiff independent pharmacists in their antitrust case filed before her in the Northern District of Alabama.  The case, brought on behalf of all similarly situated independent pharmacists seeks to address the unfair market and contracting practices of the nation's major pharmacy benefit managers or "PBMs."  The Order denies the defendant PBMs' motion to dismiss the action for failure to state a claim and allows the plaintiff independent pharmacists to begin the discovery process.  Judge Hopkins noted in the detailed opinion supporting the Order that "The Second Amended Complaint (SAC) provides the Defendants with fair notice as to the nature and basis of the claims made against them.  Moreover, the SAC affords no sound basis for ruling out the possibility that the Plaintiffs will be able to establish facts which establish a right of recovery for violation of the Sherman Act."   Review the opinion in support of the order here.

Importing Less Expensive Drugs Not Seen as Cure for U.S. Woes - 10/25/04

Article from the New York Times Online

A customer at the Concourse Drugs pharmacy in the Bronx will pay about $118 to get a month's supply of 20-milligram Lipitor pills. At PharmacyinCanada.com, a Canadian online outlet, the same quantity of the drug, Pfizer's cholesterol-lowering medication, costs $79.

The difference has become a tempting political target. Senator John Kerry, the Democratic presidential candidate, has made a campaign pledge to help cut Americans' prescription drug costs by allowing them to import drugs from Canada. President Bush has conceded that the idea is worth a try "if there's a safe way to do it." Bipartisan legislation in Congress would allow the reimportation of prescription drugs from Canada and other industrialized countries.

It may make political sense to point to Canada as a solution to high prescription drug prices in the United States. But many economists and health care experts say that importing drugs from countries that control their prices would do little to solve the problem of expensive drugs in the United States, where companies are free to set their own prices. Even the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimated that allowing Canadian drug imports would have a "negligible" impact on drug spending. Full Story...

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