As representatives of both Maine’s retail pharmacies and licensed pharmacists, we feel compelled to expand on the recent news stories regarding the CanaRx mail-order pharmacy issue.
Both of our organizations sent letters to the Maine Board of Pharmacy expressing our concern that an out-of-state, out-of-country entity was sending prescription medications without a license from the Maine Board of Pharmacy. The Maine Board of Pharmacy found reasonable grounds to refer the matter to Maine’s attorney general. Maine’s attorney general found that CanaRx was not complying with Maine law and ordered them to stop sending prescriptions to Maine people.
The bottom line is both safety and the law. The reason the state of Maine has a Board of Pharmacy, a Board of Medicine and a Board of Dentistry is to ensure standards are met and providers of health care services are properly licensed to provide safe, dependable health care to the people of Maine. Maine pharmacies and Maine pharmacists undergo rigorous licensing from both federal and state regulators — rules that every pharmacy in Maine and every pharmacist in Maine must comply with.
A pharmacy license application review by the Maine Board of Pharmacy includes: 1) verification of licensure of the pharmacy in other jurisdictions; 2) documentation of any suspensions or revocations of federal, state or local government licenses previously held by the pharmacy; and 3) documentation of the most recent inspection report from the state in which the pharmacy is located. Additionally, the pharmacy applicant must list the hours of operation of the facility, provide a layout of the store, ensure that plumbing and electrical codes are met and water quality has been assured among numerous other requirements. The complete application can be viewed at http://bdn.to/fib6.
None of these necessary checks to ensure public safety through the licensing process were submitted by CanaRx. Pharmaceuticals in the United States have a chain of command to track when and where medication was manufactured so that in the event of an incident or adverse reaction, the issue can be addressed swiftly.
We agree that access to health care is important, but it is equally important that the provider of those services is competent and properly licensed. We take issue with the statement that this entity has processed thousands of prescriptions without incident. If there were an incident, who would be informed of that incident?
CanaRx fills and ships prescriptions not only from Canada, but also from the UK, Australia and New Zealand. In addition, they have doctors located in those countries that take your Maine prescription and rewrite it in the country where your prescription is being filled. These doctors are not licensed in the state of Maine or in the United States.
We are also concerned that CanaRx’s own website states that, “Although the drugs you receive may look slightly different or have a different name than the one you are used to, for all intents and purposes they are identical.” If a citizen of Maine takes his/her medication incorrectly and suffers harm because the medicines look different and are labeled by a different name, who is responsible? The unlicensed, foreign pharmacy?
In the end, all we and others asked was that CanaRx operate by the same set of rules that Maine pharmacies are subject to, and that is to receive board approval that they are properly licensed to do business in Maine.
Curtis Picard is the executive director of the Maine Merchants Association, Maine’s retail trade organization. Kenneth L. McCall III, BSPharm, PharmD is president of the Maine Pharmacy Association.
A major case of sour grapes; Maine’s retail pharmacies and
licensed pharmacists, can you guarantee unconditionally there will be no med
errors at the local pharmacies? I need
to be able to afford required medication and local venders and drug companies
do not have my wellbeing in mind only how much money you can squeeze out of the
patient.
Claiming that Canada is a dangerous source of medication is an absurd tactic by big US companies that obviously–obviously–want to maximize their own profit and have forgotten all about caring for people in the race to guzzle money.
” The bottom line is both safety and the law.”
No Curtis, the bottom line is that CanaRx hurts your bottom line. Please do not think you can p!ss on our heads and tell us its raining.
http://goo.gl/ei3S7
It’s all about pharmacies continuing to able to charge Maine citizens enormous rates for needed Rx. I havepersonally been involved in the decision to make the voluntary CanaRX program available to Maine state employees. Never in our meetings with them or our discussions with Portland has there been any doubt about the safety of the drugs. If fact they are probably safer than those dispensed by a Maine pharmacy because they are bottled in 90 day supplies at the manufacturer, not counted and recounted by various individuals as they are at retail pharmacies. It is brand name drugs only, not generic so people are recieving the same drugs thay would receive at the paharmacy. I love it. The Governor and legislature cut $40 million from our health insurance plan and then cave to the pharmacy lobby when we find a safe and cost effective way to save money. Another example of the power of phARMA!!
Thank you Curtis Picard and Ken McCall for taking money out of my wallet. Would have been nice to see the Attorney General get Cana Rx comply rather than shut them off. At least the gov and other legislators will try to right this one!!!
This is as cynical an argument as I have ever read anywhere about anything. Are the writers saying that medical doctors who are licensed to practice in their own countries lack the same competence as American doctors? I find that rather arrogant. Also, I know I have read about licensed US pharmacies, including those in Maine, making serious errors both in medicines dispensed and in dosages, so I think they may want to reconsider their position that licensed Maine pharmacies don’t make mistakes but we need to be wary of pharmacists from other countries.
Perhaps Maine’s pharmacies should be the ones buying medications in Canada for distribution in the US. That, of course, would immediately trigger Big Pharma’s legal teams. In the end, it is all about squeezing the American healthcare consumers for all they are worth. Why do we tolerate such differential pricing? Because Congress doesn’t bite any hands that feed it.
“The bottom line is both safety and the law”……………………………. Curtis Picard & Kenneth L. McCall III, You both are showing your arrogance, to imply that CanaRx would sell sub-standard prescriptions.
All your concerned with is to keep ripping off the Maine people and that is why you don’t want competition.
Like I stated before, they can probably sell cheaper because their executives don’t get excessive bonuses, if any and don’t pay kickbacks.
The two stooges that wrote this blatant self-serving epistle, paid “shills” for the big Pharma industry in Maine, arrogantly believe that neither my wife and I, nor any other Maine citizens, are capable of making reasonable decisions about our own healthcare!
What a bunch of greedy schmucks!
Aha! Though they keep “blowing the horn of safety and quaility” the people responding beneath the stories can see through the muck to the heart of the issue, Maines greedy pharmacy chains who wish to keep obscene profits flowing into their own slimy hands.
I hope they choke on the greed eventually!
And the beginning of the push for Public Option is made louder, even if it’s one voice at a time. And Dane is right. Peeing on my leg and telling me that it’s rain is just plain insulting. Crying because your gravy train is now seen for what it is, namely a giant monopoly that’s a industry scam, is all the more reason for this obsenity to be ‘put down’ and publicly exposed. And if the Big Pharmacy lobby wants to cry ‘Wolf’, please, bring it on. Then we can all see just who has their hand in our pocket’s !
A perfect example of how government boards set up to regulate industries are captured by those industries and used to kill competition. The Republican and Democratic establishments are both pretty comfortable with this and will always say the answer to regulatory capture is… more regulation.
Privacy is a bigger problem than money or safety for this whole issue. HIPAA (the US privacy law) doesn’t impact what companies in other countries do with your medical data. If you have a disease that you’d prefer to be kept confidential, like: Diabetes, Multiple Sclerosis, Cancer, etc., and the company mailing your meds from another country leaks that info… nothing really can be done. Privacy seems like something all political parties can agree on. Especially “free market” libertarians.
Have gotten quite a few of my meds thru canada for many years, half the cost of the drugs here, never had any problems, meds all worked well, many were made right here in the USA, always wondered why they shipped them all the way to canada then canada sells them back to us for half the price?
wow. A thread where everyone’s in agreement.
wrong, why don’t all of you get it? If CanaRx gets an exemption, they I should be able to open up a pharmaceutical dispensary in my back yard, right? Either everyone follows the rules, or no one should have to (anarchy, I believe). Change the rules, and set them so that all out of country pharmacies can apply to meet certain guidelines, or keep them all out. I really don’t care if we allow out of country pharmacies if they all have to meet guidelines which guarantee safety and quality.. we could use some competition. But set decent rules and guidelines in place so that everyone can plan. It appears that most everyone here on this thread appears to have been swayed by the LePage attitude of cronies and favoritism – oh, it’s ok if it benefits me, but not if it benefits the other guy. Go look in the mirror, people!
LIARS ! Corporate money-grubbing LIARS. Mainers and others all over this country have been buying their prescription meds through Canada, even through the mail, for YEARS. This is CORPORATE PROPAGANDA. These companies don’t care about sick people. They care about their mansions. NOTHING else.
Most of you commenting on here clearly do not know all the facts in this situation. First of all the Maine Merchants Association, while representing some national chains like Walgreens or Rite Aid, also represents independent pharmacies and other local, Maine businesses. The Maine Pharmacy Association represents pharmacists in the state of Maine. Neither of those groups include Pfizer, Bristol-Myers-Squibb, or any other national pharmaceutical company in their ranks. CanaRx is violating the law by dispensing drugs in Maine without a license. If you want to change the law to allow them to dispense drugs in Maine, then go ahead and do that, but it’s certainly not the fault of the independent and chain pharmacies who have little to no control over the cost of medications (mainly dictated to them by either the pharmaceutical companies or insurance companies) for pointing out that they just want CanaRx to play by the same rules that they play by. Rules, by the way, which would protect you in case something ever did go wrong with your medication and which CanaRx currently does not have to abide by. I am sorry that the cost of your medications is going to go up, but maybe you should be talking to the pharmacists to discuss your medication therapy and any possible cost-saving alternatives.
CanaRx is being fixed thru corrective legislation as we speak, even with Paulie in agreement (Yes, the cloud’s did part and The Voice did speak !). What’s going to be seen as the next, and inevitable, move forward is when Maine pharmacy’s start dispensing generic’s, and when needed Canadian, pharmacuetical’s in the face of the current Drug Industry’s threats of cutting them off. Maine is the obvious State for this to happen and it’s high time that this nonsense was put to a stop. That the Governor decided to jump in should be seen by the Drug Company’s as the last sign on the road that they are gonna lose. Like it or not, and yes in Maine it’s a first, even LePage has caved into the inevitable of the ACA actually showing just how effective even 1 small part of it is. You can bet the Drug Company’s are keeping track of it. Now is the time to make it LAW and start looking out for Mainer’s who are hurting, not another Corporation that looks at Maine as a line item on it’s balance sheet of asset’s.
It’s also smart business for Maine’s business’s that either offer, or want to offer, health insurance since this Program cost’s around 1/5th of what current perscription plan’s cost. After all, a healthy workforce is more productive and cost’s less in sick downtime, doesn’t it ?
This safety argument is complete garbage. This is about money. Let’s at least have an honest conversation.
Its not a matter of Canada being a dangerous source for purchasing medication its the pure fact that the CanaRx is an illegal corporation in the state of Maine. Keneth McCall and Curtis Picard make a completely valid point that the Pharmacy is illegal. There goal is not to have everyone purchase expensive medication but rather insure the safety of the medications that everyone is purchasing.
If CanaRx was illegal in the 1st place it would never have been used by the State EA or Hardwood’s. That it’s now ‘suddenly’ illegal is nothing more than the Maine Pharmacy Association seeing it’s gravy train comng to an inevitable end and trying to keep it going just that much longer by trying to eliminate the competition thru administrative, not economic, means. That the MPA is crying so loud also tells me that CanaRx is more than successful in that it’s clearly cutting into the MPA’s competition. Get over it ! This is part of the ACA and is actually showing that it works if it is left alone to do so.
The AG’s Office getting into this also calls for a serious review of just who’s in charge and who’s actually is directing the Office. This whole thing could have been corrected thru the AG and the State Legislature working together instead of getting into a ‘spitball’ contest. That the Governor is now behind CanaRx’s model, and is not going to stand in the way of Maine’s Legislature in getting corrective legislation to make this health care solution work for Mainer’s, should also have been seen as a huge ‘NO GO’ sign. The MPA plain and old fashioned got caught and is crying. Maybe it’s time that these ‘Association’s were finally seen for what they are instead of just pooh-pooh’ed’ away as a needed evil.