Canadian officials seek drug sale ban

Canadian pharmacy regulators Friday asked their government to temporarily ban the sale of prescription drugs to Americans, saying the practice was causing shortages for Canadians and overburdening the nation’s pharmacy system.

The National Association of Pharmacy Regulatory Authorities said the growing sales to Americans are undermining the Canadian regulatory system and are likely to harm Canadians in the future.

In a statement, the organization said it “requests that the federal government ban the exporting of drugs from Canadian pharmacies to citizens of other countries until such time as government can implement systems that will ensure the effective regulation of these practices to protect public safety.”

While the group representing 7,000 traditional pharmacists in Canada generally welcomed the call, the organization that represents the roughly 140 Canadian businesses that export drugs to the United States condemned the statement and urged the government to ignore it.

“This is an irresponsible statement designed to harm a prospering Canadian industry,” said Andrew Troszok of the Canadian International Pharmaceutical Association. “Our pharmacies have made the country a global player in health care.”

Friday’s statement by the association of provincial boards that oversee pharmacies follows by two weeks a formal warning from Health Canada, the nation’s medical service, that the country could face drug shortages this winter because of the growing cross-border trade. Health Canada assistant deputy minister Diane Gorman said the risk of shortages is “a very serious matter.”

The cross-border sale of price-controlled – and therefore cheaper – Canadian drugs has ballooned in recent years, and several American governors and mayors have said they want to begin purchasing those drugs in bulk. While it is illegal for Americans to buy drugs from Canada, the Food and Drug Administration allows limited purchases for personal use, and Congress is debating whether to legalize the cross-border sales.

Barbara Wells, executive director of the Canadian pharmacy association, said members of her group are already reporting increasing drug shortages, especially for insulin. She also said her group is concerned there aren’t enough Canadian pharmacists to care for the drug needs of both Canadians and Americans.

She conceded there is no direct evidence that sales to the United States were causing the shortages. Some American officials and Canadian observers have said the shortages may have been triggered by announcements that some pharmaceutical companies plan to cut back on shipments to Canadian pharmacies that sell their products via the Internet to Americans.

Troszok of the international pharmacies group said there were no proven shortages in Canada. He accused the FDA and now Canadian officials of “fear-mongering” in an effort to slow the growth of the cross-border trade.

FDA Commissioner Mark McClellan will travel to Canada on Tuesday to speak with his counterpart and to discuss ways to better control drug sales. More than 1.2 million Americans are expected to get prescription drugs from Canada this year.