Canada moves to prevent drug imports--And they are right.

[Tamyrlin79]

Canada is moving to prevent the U.S. from importing drugs when supplies get low, saying that they will not put Canadians' health at risk in order to be a cheap drug store for the United States.

I agree with Canada's position. At least their government is watching out for their interests, unlike some governments I could name.

I have disagreed with the Democratic Party's saying that the Republicans wouldn't support importing drugs from Canada, implying that they should do so to help with American drug prices. Canada's reaction is demonstrating why this is not a good policy.

The fact is that we will just be leeching off of Canada's system to subsidize our own, out-of-control healthcare system. This is not proper, and it is not the correct policy. The correct policy is to reform our broken system so that we don't have to depend on Canada. But, the Democrats are proposing a bad solution to a real problem because they are too afraid to tackle the larger issue: How do we reform our healthcare system?

So, to me, it is just another example of Democrats being cowardly, rather than displaying their own boldness by taking healthcare head on. They are clearly still horse-shy from getting thrown by the reaction to "Hillary-care" and that whole debacle. It is something that they need to get over fast, and come up with a real alternative on rather than proposing stop-gap measures for a problem that cries out for larger, bolder solutions.

[applegrove]

1. I think the Dems are doing some policy work on health care as we

speak. It works. Much better than private medicine. But they are likely appealing to all Americans with the program ideas..so it will take time and lots of discussion needs to take place.

[TheFarseer]

2. yes, the dems policy is half-assed

We need to make generic drugs right here in the USA not tip-toe around rules to get generics imported.

[HysteryDiagnosis]

3. Fortunately glyconutrients have removed the need for many many

medications... there will come a day when the majority of the population is aware of this and the pharmcos stranglehold on our health (and checkbooks) will be released.

[Nikki Stone 1]

4. Huh? Is this the Tom Cruise approach to medicine?

:tinfoilhat:

[HysteryDiagnosis]

5. Nope, it's the future of wellness without chemicals. Your liver makes

several specific sugars. It does this through a backup system. These sugars are used to create delicate filaments that pass messages between individual cells in the body.

Immunity is enhance when there are more, rather than less of these sugars.

Many diseases have been shown to have incomplete glycoprotein synthesis. Lupus, autism, diabetes, autoimmune rheumatoid arthritis, sjogren's syndrome, scleroderma, etc.

This is not the Tom Cruise approach to wellness. This is an area of biology called glycobiology and Oxford University would not have an entire section, wing or building dedicated to it if it weren't something special.

If you goto the national institutes of health, and search for glycoprotein, you will get over 30,000 clinical papers on a whole host of illnesses.

It's not rocket science, it's just answering a need in the body that nothing else can replace.

Flame on.

[Nikki Stone 1]

6. Ok. I'll flame if you like.

So how do they stimulate the growth of these glycoproteins? There has to be some kind of chemical to do that.

[HysteryDiagnosis]

7. Would you take a short look at this.....

could you agree that if a person was:

A: elderly
B: sickly
C: stressed out
D: virally challenged
E: Chemically overburdened
F: Bacterially challenged
G: Genetically challenged, that he/she "might" have a hard time synthesizing the sugars that are incorporated into glycoproteins, and thus lead to a state where cellular messaging is compromised. Do you know how important it is that cellular messaging remains optimal?? Please look at this....

http://web.indstate.edu/thcme/mwking/protein-modifications.html

[Nikki Stone 1]

8. Did you read my question?

I actually am interested in the answer. :)

[HysteryDiagnosis]

10. The growth of glycoproteins is a natural bodily/cellular function.

Having the raw materials with which to do it is a plus... that is unless you can think of another way in which to build something.

[getmeouttahere]

9. The richest country in the world.....

should be able to supply its citizens with affordable prescription drugs, but of course our governments priorities are elsewhere...that's not Canada's fault

[HamdenRice]

11. Canada is dead wrong on exporting drugs to the US

The Canadian politician who stated that Canada should not export drugs to the US was simply demonstrating his ignorance of the big pharma industry, and he has misled you and many other people.

When the debate about Americans buying drugs in Canada first began, the MSM used a much more honest and revealing term to describe the process: drug reimportation. It was called reimportation, because Americans who purchase drugs from Canada are not buying some limited pool of Canadian-manufactured drugs; they are buying drugs made right here in the good ol' US of A. In other words, the so-called Canadian drugs are US or internationally manufactured drugs that have been exported to Canada, and then reimported back into the US at Canadian prices. This also shows the utter absurdity and dishonesty of shrub administration claims about the safety of drug imports from Canada; they are the same damned drugs!

This means that when we buy Canadian drugs, we are not snatching those drugs from the mouths of our Canadian bothers and sisters. If Americans purchase vast amounts of drugs from Canada, Canadian drug companies will simply import more of those drugs to meet the demand. The only Canadian resources we would be straining would be their postal service, Canadian branches of Federal Express and warehouses -- all at a tidy profit!

The whole reimportation system just shows that the prices of drugs are completely arbitrary. Big pharma wants to set them at whatever price the market will bear, even though the health insurance system, and the fact that many drugs are absolutely life saving means that there is no really effective, normal market for these drugs. So progressive, rational governments all over the (world except the US) realize that drug prices must be regulated and set by democratic political processes, not by big pharma extortion of the sick. All Canada really exports with its drugs is its public interest oriented and patient friendly drug regulatory system.

Reimportation actually is a kind of consumer-friendly globalization. Just as corporations use globalization to create a "race to the bottom" with respect to wages, labor conditions and environmental regulation -- that is in terms of the prices they pay for things -- drug reimportation and other forms of the international consumer market creates a consumer driven race to the bottom in terms of prices we as consumers pay for things.

What's good for the corporate goose is good for the consumer gander. Anything else is stacking the globalization deck in favor of the corporations.

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

13. A caveat...

Drug companies may be limiting the volume of their drugs imported to Canada, in order to create a false shortage. I don't know that this is actually the situation, mind you, but if it is, I would have to side with Canada on this one.

[flpoljunkie]

12. Dems should demand Medicare be able to buy in bulk, and keep screaming

about it, until the Rethugs cave. Problem is too many of them also have their hands out for the pharmaceutical "payola"--so don't count on it happening, unless the citizens demand it.

If they can't get it done in a Republican Congress, at least they can let everyone one know who is holding it up. Pressure on the Republicans might get it done with the mid-term elections coming up next year.

Dubya's Medicare drug bill has saddled us taxpayers with paying the pharmaceutical companies top dollar for drugs, and, if not rescinded, will run up an untenable national debt.