[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 149 (2003), Part 11]
[House]
[Page 15071]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




         THE STRAIGHT STORY ON THE HIGH COST OF PHARMACEUTICALS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Franks of Arizona). Under a previous 
order of the House, the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Burton) is 
recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. BURTON of Indiana. Mr. Speaker, for some time now, a number of us 
have been coming to the floor of the House to talk about the high cost 
of prescription drugs here in the United States. We pay more for 
prescription drugs than any country on the face of the Earth, and many 
of our senior citizens and others have been going right across the 
border into Canada and buying pharmaceutical products for half or one-
tenth the cost that they are here in the United States.
  Now, the Food and Drug Administration and the pharmaceutical 
companies are doing everything they can to stop Americans from buying 
pharmaceutical products from Canada by saying that there is a safety 
issue. The fact of the matter is, we checked, the gentleman from 
Minnesota (Mr. Gutknecht) and myself and others; and we have found no 
cases, none, where Canadian pharmaceutical products that were made here 
in the United States and reimported back into this country have caused 
anybody any harm. Absolutely zero.
  Now, in my congressional district, the PhRMA companies have been 
mailing literature to senior citizens saying that there is a safety 
issue if you buy pharmaceutical products from Canada because they may 
be contaminated or counterfeit or something else. We have found no 
cases like that. But they are mailing them into my district trying to 
scare people trying to influence them to influence me to change my 
position. Americans should pay no more for pharmaceutical products than 
they do in other parts of the world; and yet we pay more, by far, than 
any country: France, Germany, Spain, Canada, anyplace.
  Now, today I was watching television and there is a man I respect a 
great deal, Neal Cavuto; he has a great television show, and he is a 
very fair newsman. He had a gentleman on his program that said that 
there was a real problem with safety of these pharmaceutical products 
coming in from Canada, and the gentleman who was on was so vociferous 
and so adamant about this that I feel that he must have been paid by 
the pharmaceutical companies; and if he is not, he should be. Because 
he is trying to scare Americans into believing they should not buy 
these pharmaceutical products from Canada.
  We have over a million people a year that buy their products from 
there because they cost so much less, and the attempt is being made to 
stop that by the Food and Drug Administration saying they are not safe 
when there is no evidence of that, and by the pharmaceutical companies 
who are saying they are following the edicts of the Food and Drug 
Administration.
  Now, we are coming up with a prescription drug benefit before too 
long, and unless we get a handle on these prices and make sure that the 
American people are paying prices similar to the rest of the world, the 
taxpayer is going to be picking up the difference between what they pay 
in Canada and what they pay here in the United States. The senior 
citizens want the prescription drug benefit, and we want to give it to 
them; but we do not want the taxpayers of this country saddled with 
extremely high prices for the products they can buy right across the 
border for less money.
  So it is extremely important, in my opinion, that we get this message 
out to the American people. And the pharmaceutical companies have $150 
million they are dumping into an ad campaign to try to convince people 
that these products are not safe when that is just not the case.
  So I would just like to say if Mr. Cavuto happens to be watching 
tonight or any other television commentator, please be fair. Be sure to 
have the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Gutknecht) or myself or somebody 
else who has been studying this issue for some time on the program as 
well to rebut those who are paid for by the pharmaceutical companies to 
make sure the American people are getting the story straight; not 
biased, but straight.

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