Some senators who supported a 2009 drug-importation measure withdrew their backing
Bemoaning the baleful "intersection of money and power and politics in Washington, D.C.,'' Sen. David Vitter, R-La., watched his amendment to allow the importation of FDA-approved prescription drugs via the Internet or by mail from Canada go down to defeat Thursday.
Sen. David Vitter, R-La., walks near the floor of the Senate on Dec. 15. "You know, President Obama often decries that intersection of big money and big power in Washington, and I agree with him, but I think the single biggest example of that money run amok in Washington buying power and influencing politics in the last few years has been Big PhRMA dealing with the White House, specifically, visiting the White House over and over and over during the development of Obamacare, and in the end, supporting Obamacare and, oh, by the way, in the end the president no longer supporting reimportation, which he had consistently up to this point," Vitter said in remarks on the Senate floor. "I do decry that sort of intersection of money and politics."
The Vitter amendment, which would have required 60 votes, got only 45, and his office immediately sent out a statement listing 14 Democratic senators, including Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-Louisiana, who in 2009 had supported what the senator described as "essentially the exact same legislation," which passed then with wide bipartisan support.
"What happened in the meantime," said Vitter, was both the health-care deal, in which former Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America chief Billy Tauzin, a onetime Louisiana congressman, led the industry group into backing the president's plan, and another round of intense lobbying by the trade group, which represents the leading research-based pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies in the United States, against his amendment.
A PhRMA spokesman said that Vitter's new amendment, in fact, is not identical to his 2009 measure, and that the decision by more than a dozen senators to reappraise their position on the wisdom of reimportation was likely a consequence of their paying better attention to the arguments against it and realizing what an eminently bad idea it is.
"This was a bipartisan vote against a very dangerous proposal that would have put patients in harm's way," PhRMA spokeswoman Jennifer Page Wall said. "What this amendment would have done is allowed U.S. patients to buy their prescription drugs on Canadian websites. What many people don't know is that a lot of these Internet sites are run by criminal networks that display the Canadian flag on their website to lure consumers into thinking it's a safe site."
A 2005 FDA operation found that many of the drugs customers think they are importing from Canada actually come from any number of other counties, and they may not safe or effective.
Wall said that while the 2009 amendment was an attempt to keep U.S. Customs and Border Protection from trying to keep the drugs from coming into the country from Canada, this amendment targeted the Food and Drug Administration's ability to do its job.
A Landrieu spokesman said she "supports drug reimportation when it can be assured that the supply chain is safe and regulated effectively. The Vitter amendment voted on today is different from the amendment that she supported in 2009. The language was modified in such a way that it would hamper the FDA's ability to respond to problems that may arise from current drug importation policy."
In the meantime, the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee is working on its own legislation on drug reimportation.
The White House did not comment on Vitter's criticism.
Jonathan Tilove can be reached at jtilove@timespicayune.com or 202.450.1404.