The pharmaceutical industry may be fuming, but as of today, Maine residents can start purchasing prescription drugs over the Internet, thanks to a contentious law that has some predicting the initiative could be duplicated in still more states. Residents are allowed to purchase medicines from Internet pharmacies in Canada, the UK, New Zealand and Australia (back story here).
The law underscores the extent to which prescription drug pricing remains an issue, despite the passage of the Medicare D program several years ago. Many state employees, as well as workers in the city of Portland and one large company, claimed they saved some $10 million through Internet purchases over several years.
For this reason, the law had backing from some in the state business community and dissuaded the Republican governor from issuing a veto. But the savings ended last summer after the former state attorney general banned such businesses from doing licensed business in Maine. The law, however, is being met with a stiff challenge.
Last month, the PhRMA trade group, the Maine Pharmacy Association and the Maine Society for Health System Pharmacists, among others, filed a lawsuit charging that the state law circumvents federal regulations governing prescription drugs, encroaches on the power of the federal government to regulate foreign commerce and could pose serious health risks to consumers (our back story here).
"If Maine can do this, other states will do this. It could have a big impact on pharmaceutical companies' long-term profits and desire to invent new medications," Boston University economics professor Laurence Kotlikoff, who researches drug imports, tells The Wall Street Journal. "On the other hand, in some areas, (drugmakers) need to be brought back in line."
Using CanaRx, a Canadian broker that was shipping drugs to Maine employees until last summer, Portland pays $200.90 for a 90-day supply of 40 mg tablets of the Nexium heartburn drug and waives employee copays, according to the Journal. The same order that was negotiated by Aetna, which provides health insurance to the city, costs $621.08, with the employee contributing 25 percent of the expense, or $155.27.
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