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Our prescription drug system needs an overhaul. This isn't a matter of all drugs are illegal to import because of quality control issues. You can import aspir

• mschuster91 4y ago
  The international pharmaceutical trade market is already under fire with contamination and fraud issues as it is. 300.000 to 1 million people are estimated to die each year from that per the WHO [1] - that's frankly insane, and it's not just fake penis enlargement pills that people buy on random spam platforms, but the fraudsters even manage to penetrate into the legitimate supply chain of German pharmacies. The solution is obvious: more domestic production, and for the US to get their shit together. You don't need to throw pills for every little cough, the fact that y'all have ads for prescription medicine is completely mind-blowing. Like, I go to the doctor with symptoms, not with a shopping list of stuff shilled in yesterday's cable news. [1] https://www.tagesschau.de/inland/securpharm-101.html https://www.tagesschau.de/inland/securpharm-101.html
  • 55555 4y ago
    Anytime the topic of the FDA/customs seizing pharma drugs imported by Americans comes up, big pharma and confused citizens conflate the amount of counterfeit branded drugs with actually dangerous drugs. No one is fighting for the right to be able to buy fake Cialis. They are fighting for the right to buy generic Tadalafil manufactured by billion-dollar Indian companies trusted by over a billion people with the proper FDA certifications in India. Those who mislabel their brand should still be prosecuted. That's barely relevant. Yes, we take too many drugs. But we also don't take enough, because we can't afford it, because we're all being squeezed by big pharma. (You're also conflating the Americans who have decent health insurance with those who don't.) And almost no health insurance covers dick pills and no adult should have to explain to a stranger that their dick doesn't work to get their permission to take a super safe drug with a few clearly-described risks. (The truth is, half the online pharma business is literally just dick pills. Half.) I've been interested in this topic for 15+ years. The good news is, despite what this article may lead a casual reader to believe, 99% of the DEA-uncontrolled medications imported are not seized. You can order them safely, and if they are seized, they shipper will probably send them again for free, and you won't have any legal issues.
    • sithadmin 4y ago
      >They are fighting for the right to buy generic Tadalafil manufactured by billion-dollar Indian companies trusted by over a billion people with the proper FDA certifications in India. The revenue of a pharma manufacturer is not necessarily an indicator of quality. Many international pharma firms of supposed good repute have repeatedly been found to be committing egregious levels of good manufacturing practice (GMP) violations, and even when they have production lines that stand up to FDA audits, parallel production lines in the same firm that aren't subject to FDA scrutiny (as they produce for non-US markets) often are churning out very suspicious products for local / developing world consumption. And even US-based production lines can be churning out product with potential defect for quite some time during gaps between FDA audits - it happens all the time. A really eye opening read on the global pharma quality situation: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/13/books/review/bottle-of-lies-katherine-eban.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/13/books/review/bottle-of-li...
      • rysertio 4y ago
        Anther problem is that most drugs you buy in the US with extremely inflated prices are produced overseas within those facilities.
  • jnovek 4y ago
    I understand where you’re coming from because our medical system IS lazy and DOES overprescribe, but the knee-jerky “pills bad” thing is frustrating for those of us who are necessarily on a lot of medications. This cultural phenomenon has roots so deep that I’ve had actual medical professionals (usually nurses) tell me that I’m on too many pills. On a few occasions I’ve invited them to tell me which ones I should get rid of and, of course, they don’t know because all of the medications are currently doing something important. It’s an attitude that mystifies me. Pharmaceuticals have side effects, do people think I want to take this stuff?
    • mschuster91 4y ago
      I'm referring to antibiotics prescriptions for clear-as-day viral infections (~~strep~~, influenza, covid). That shit is one of the largest contributors to multi- or omniresistant superbugs, right behind the even worse practice of using human reserve antibiotics routinely in industrial farming.
      • Tozen 4y ago
        Actually, that's hard to say. Many people don't completely take the antibiotics prescribed to them. They don't take them when they are supposed to and take them for a few days or less than the total time they are supposed to. The bug can then become resistant to the antibiotic, so they have to switch to something else. Problem is, there are only so many types of antibiotics, which may or may not work on that specific bug. This foolishness leads to resistant superbugs as well.
        • dangwhy 4y ago
          https://www.bmj.com/content/358/bmj.j3418 https://www.bmj.com/content/358/bmj.j3418
      • nick__m 4y ago
        Your post is almost correct but strep is Streptococcus Pyogenes, it is a gram positive bacteria and it is usually treated with PenVK.
• Tozen 4y ago
  > This is asthma and cancer medication being seized because of an overly tight control of prescription drugs. Actually, many of these are medications (even life saving ones) being seized to protect inflated pharmaceutical pricing and profits at the expense of poorer Americans (and those lacking health care). Significant numbers of people are ordering the medications out of desperation.
  • skyyler 4y ago
    I order my medications illegally because it's so much cheaper than doing it through the legitimate system.
    • dangwhy 4y ago
      how is this not stealing from people who are buying these drugs through the legitimate system.
      • plussed_reader 4y ago
        Funny you see the theft in one direction and not the other. Isn't the black market just a natural expression of agents engaging in free market principles?
        • deleted 4y ago
          [deleted]
      • edmundsauto 4y ago
        Because there is no actual theft going on? Are you suggesting that local “legitimate” users pay higher costs to recoup R&D expenses? I’d love to hear the evidence - it sounds a lot to me like the “piracy is theft” argument which has not been proved or well supported.
        • dangwhy 4y ago
          > Are you suggesting that local “legitimate” users pay higher costs to recoup R&D expenses? I’d love to hear the evidence Yes ? Are you suggesting they that comes out of pharma profits? > it sounds a lot to me like the “piracy is theft” argument which has not been proved or well supported. No because not taking medication isn't an option like not watching a pirated movie. Perhaps a closer analogy is shoplifting . Sure some amount of stealing is accounted for in the system but large scale shoplifting gets passed on to consumers.
• sithadmin 4y ago
  > I understand that some drugs sold overseas are not suitable for human consumption Frankly, a lot of FDA-approved drugs sold in the US aren't suitable for consumption, especially generics manufactured outside the US. The FDA simply doesn't have the resources to enforce good manufacturing practices and product consistency, so a lot of subpar medication manages to slip under the radar and into the US market. The situation is much more grim for non-US buyers, who often get products of significantly worse quality. 'Bottle of Lies' by Katherine Eban[1] provides a thorough and very unsettling exposé on the issue. [1]https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/13/books/review/bottle-of-lies-katherine-eban.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/13/books/review/bottle-of-li...
  • gtop3 4y ago
    Prescription drugs are barred from being imported for a different reason than quality control because non prescription drugs are allowed to be imported.
    • kridsdale1 4y ago
      Buying affordable medicine is a crime not because there is a health risk, but because you are engaging in copyright infringement. You aren’t paying your toll to the Nice Men who bought their right to monopoly.
      • gtop3 4y ago
        The FDA has rules limiting the import of all prescription drugs, and does not distinguish between drugs with an active patent and those with an expired patent. In addition, it's possible to purchase patented drugs that are manufactured legally overseas. I think you are conflating illegally manufactured medicine and laws for importing medicine. You can see the FDA makes no mention on if the medicine is under a patent when setting it's rules for which prescription drugs can be imported [0]. [0] https://www.fda.gov/industry/import-basics/personal-importation https://www.fda.gov/industry/import-basics/personal-importat...
      • sithadmin 4y ago
• shagie 4y ago
  > I argue that many medications are quite safe to take without supervision and using doctors as gatekeepers functions primarily to increase the billings generated by sick people. A may be safe. B may be safe. A + B may very well be deadly. C may be safe, but in combination with grapefruit is ineffective. D may be safe, but interactions with E and F need to be balanced and monitored to ensure that the body's systems don't get out of whack. G may be safe, but it has recreational use (and abuse) possibilities. H may be safe, but is a precursor to creating Z which is heavily regulated. ... and the list goes on. Most drugs have a "this can go wrong" and with the prevalence of people taking whatever they find or people are talking about (see hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin for some widely popularized examples), I am hesitant to suggest that the common person is sufficiently informed about drugs to take that aspect of their medical care into their own hands without oversight.
  • dllthomas 4y ago
    In theory you can oversee without broadly disallowing.
    • shagie 4y ago
      How much of G and H are you going to let one person buy? How do you make sure that the person is coming in to have bloodwork done if they're on D, E, and F? If a person is buying A over the counter and you prescribe B - where is that check being done?
  • gtop3 4y ago
    > I am hesitant to suggest that the common person is sufficiently informed about drugs to take that aspect of their medical care into their own hands without oversight. I generally agree that there are cases where prescription medications should be controlled. My argument is that too many medications are prescription. Several OTC medications are inappropriate to mix with other OTC medications, require monitoring with long term use, or have interactions with grapefruit. People make fatal decisions with OTC medications. Some OTC medications have recreational potential. These concerns are not unique to prescription medication. I am not persuaded by the argument that individuals are not capable of making their own medical decisions. A doctor can advise a patient which OTC medications to take, and this type of consultation will still be available. Pharmacists will also answer questions about OTC medications they sell. I think there is an ocean of difference between "Medical advise is available to you if you choose this treatment" and "Medical advise is required to even choose this treatment." We are using the later too frequently, and I suspect many want to keep it this way to drive up healthcare costs.
• rhuru 4y ago
  The FDA model is broken. It is pretty much a Nazi model where private industry is protected from competition and also dictated to by heavy handed government pencil pushers. Good things wont come out of it. The claims like "foreign drugs might be dangerous" is simply dumbing down of reality of world and false. While your average joe wont know if the insulin he got from Tijuana is good or not, denying him the insulin entirely is even bigger threat to Joe's life. Not just that but now you have insulin smugglers who are even bigger threat as they are totally off the legal scrutiny. But American Diabetic Association can do a better job of importing insulin from world over at cheaper prices and distributing it to their members while ensuring reasonable quality. Unlike FDA, ADA can actually work with insurance companies to compensate the victims if things go wrong.
  • red-iron-pine 4y ago
    You Goodwin'd yourself in the first line, killer. The Nazis have nothing to do with this, it's bog-standard regulatory capture, which is a thing everywhere but extremely prevalent in the US. Take a look at the F500 (or F50) list and see how many large insurance and healthcare companies are on there. None of them are Nazis; most of those companies have straight-up woke policies. But they lobby hard, and that's why the model is broken.