March 9, 2004

HOW CANADA WILL PAY FOR ITS DEFENSE:

Medicare Nominee Backs Drug Imports (ROBERT PEAR, 3/09/04, NY Times)

President Bush's nominee to run Medicare and Medicaid, Dr. Mark B. McClellan, said Monday that he would work with Congress on bipartisan legislation to assure the safety of prescription drugs imported from Canada.

The way to do that is by giving the Food and Drug Administration more money, more personnel and more power to police imports, Dr. McClellan said at his confirmation hearing before the Senate Finance Committee.

"I absolutely am committed to doing that," so Americans can safely import lower-cost medicines, he said.


When enough people want something they get it, no matter how foolish it may be as public policy. Meanwhile, though it will stifle research (not necessarily a bad thing), it will at least result in other nations defraying our health costs.

Posted by Orrin Judd at March 9, 2004 8:29 AM
Comments

Most likely, re-importation from Canada will result in the destruction of Canada's little gravy train. Geesh, don't these people know anything about economics?

It just takes a couple of seconds of thought to figure this one out.
Canada: population 20M. USA: populaton 300M. The demand will jump by 10X. What happens to prices when the demand jumps that much?

I love what's going to happen to Canada. They're so arogant and snotty to the US, yet they are almost entirely dependent on us for their snatdard of living.

Posted by: fred at March 9, 2004 9:06 AM

The problem is that most of the proposed legislation for allowing reimportation from Canada works only in theory but would never work in practice, unless Canada basically turned its own drug regulation over to FDA.

Posted by: David Cohen at March 9, 2004 9:22 AM

The solution for drug companies is clear: stop selling your products in Canada.

Posted by: Mike Earl at March 9, 2004 10:01 AM

Canada's population is about 30 million.

And having a quiet neighbor that gives no cause to build fences on a long border is not too bad when you think of it. True, there's several who could be a lot less snotty, but now that the head snot is out of office, things may be looking up a bit.

(Did I mention the elk?....)

Posted by: Barry Meislin at March 9, 2004 12:34 PM

Not just the head snot, but a lot of the little snots who surrounded him seem to be headed for a domestic lesson in humility. Ya gotta love the spectacle of a financial scandal in which the then Finanace and now Prime Minister's only defense can be summed up as that he didn't know it was going on. And they caracature Bush as a moron...


Posted by: Raoul Ortega at March 9, 2004 1:45 PM

Canada will pay for its defense, the same way it always has, by staying close to the world's leading power.

Posted by: Robert Schwartz at March 9, 2004 6:10 PM

> though it will stifle research (not necessarily a bad thing)

Warning to oj: Leon Kass is posting blog entries under your name!

Posted by: Kirk Parker at March 10, 2004 2:10 AM
« MONSTER OUTSIDE THE BOX: | Main | THE DEMOCRACY FETISH: »