Online Pharmacy Pioneer Arrested In Florida

FeatherBoa writes "A Manitoba man who was one of the first entrepreneurs in the cross-border online pharmacy industry has been arrested in Florida and is facing charges related to the sale of foreign and counterfeit medicines. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration claimed many of the drugs promoted as Canadian actually came from other countries. An FDA spokesperson commented, 'Many of these websites are operating outside of the United States. However, the internet's broad reach allows these websites to reach U.S. consumers.'"

Re:Alternate interpretation

[jhoegl]

The medical industry has found that it is best to take advantage of the sick by reducing production and increasing demand.
For example, over the counter Vial of 70/30 humalin in 2002 was $20, now it is $76. 10 years later it has "inflated" well past even grocery store inflation.
The cost of gas is not the cause.

Re:Alternate interpretation

[Greyfox]

More like ordering delivery from that Tijuana taco stand. I bet if you operated a taco stand just on the other side of the border and tried to deliver into the USA, you'd get busted for that too. The FDA has also been cracking down on the production and sale of Mexican Bathtub Cheese [colostate.edu] and raw milk, despite the fact that most of the people imbibing those particular delicacies are well aware of the potential risk.

Re:Alternate interpretation

[ColdWetDog]

That product is long, long out of patent protection and available in generic form. No single company should be able to constrict demand. Even if that is the case, then they fall under antitrust laws and a suit should be filed.

Most of the drugs that have been subject to shortages have been generics. Cheap generics. Even after all of the hue and cry about the shortages (this is apparently a US only issue) it isn't very clear exactly WHY the drugs are in short supply. It may well be that they are too cheap - it's simply not profitable to make the drug, test it and deal with the various regulatory agents for the price the market will bear. It may be that the generic companies don't have their manufacturing acts together. It may be an evil conspiracy set in place by the Illuminati. It may be all of the above.

Antitrust has (likely) very little to do with this. In fact, most of the drugs that I've seen that are short supplied have numerous sources - at least from the pharmacy ordering end. Whether or not there are multiple manufacturers is harder to discern.

And further, even for generics, the inflation rate has tracked way past pretty much everything else for years.