Reasonable drug prices

Your account of the Maine Public Policy Institute’s Portland conference on re-importation of prescription drugs from Canada certainly made for provocative reading.

At first, it was disconcerting to be faulted for an “outspoken anti-drug company stance,” that “undermines efforts with the Baldacci administration to attract research dollars.” Then I realized the company I was accused of keeping – respected legislators from both Republican and Democratic parties, such as Art Mayo and Tom Kane, not to mention the Bangor Daily News’ own medical columnist, Dr. Erik Steele.

The source of this accusation, conference speaker Douglas Johnson, is seriously astray of the facts in his attempt to explain away the punishingly high drug prices that are charged to Mainers and to all Americans.

Most of the basic research leading to truly new prescription drugs has been funded through the National Institutes of Health and other taxpayer-supported institutions. Drug company research, in large part, produces new versions of existing drugs, rather than anything that could be described as a medical breakthrough. The implication that our sky-high drug prices are needed to cure cancer demeans the work of government-funded researchers who really are on the front lines of medical research. Even so, the private pharmaceutical companies benefit from major tax breaks aimed at supporting just the kind of research we are accused of impairing.

I’ve backed Gov. Angus King’s and Gov. John Baldacci’s proposals for increased state funding for research and development every opportunity I’ve had. These include several bond issues, most recently one last year, which provided a critical boost to world-class research at the The Jackson Laboratory in Bar Harbor and other institutions around the state.

High American drug prices have, unfortunately, little to do with drug company research. Research budgets at many drug companies are less than sales and marketing costs. Rather, high prices result from the Bush administration’s stubborn refusal to negotiate prices the way every other nation does.

And no, unlike the contention of another conference speaker, higher American drug prices have nothing to do with Canadians’ supposedly lower incomes. Per capita income is nearly the same in Canada as here, although it varies by province. The Bush administration’s zeal to boost industry profits is so strong that the new Medicare drug benefit specifically prohibits any price negotiation. So it’s no surprise that a bill supposedly costing $400 billion will actually cost $550 billion – a fact that former HHS Medicare administrator Thomas Scully illegally concealed from Congress, threatening to fire the actuary who was about to release the information when the bill was being debated. Though Scully may be fined, he’s already landed a lucrative health care position in the private sector. Guess who will pay the extra $150 billion?

Mainers shouldn’t be distracted by the flimsy arguments put forth at the Portland conference. I’m proud of our efforts to ensure reasonable drug prices to all Maine citizens. Re-importation of drugs from Canada shouldn’t be necessary, but it’s one tool to break the monopoly pricing of an industry that doesn’t respond to any other kind of persuasion.

I think I’m in good company, after all.

House Speaker Pat Colwell is serving his fourth and final term, under legislative term limits, and represents Gardiner and Randolph.