Pharmaceutical power
By Solita Collas-Monsod
Inquirer
Last updated 02:21am (Mla time) 08/11/2007
MANILA, Philippines -- It is a reflection of the power of the multinational pharmaceutical companies in the Philippines that almost 20 years after the passage of the Generics Law in the Philippines, generic products account for less than 5 percent of drugs and medicines sold in the country. This is in contrast with what is happening in the United States, which passed a similar law only four years before we did, but where generics now account for 60 percent of drug sales.
And this state of affairs persists even in the face of incontrovertible evidence that the prices of commonly used, branded medicines sold here can be as much as 10 times higher than the same medicines sold in other Asian countries and, sometimes, even higher than they are sold in industrial countries like the United States and Canada. We’re talking not only about the same medicine but the same manufacturer, mind you.
It is also a reflection of the power of the multinational pharmaceutical companies in the Philippines that Sen. Mar Roxas has been unsuccessful so far in pushing for his bill (filed in 2005) that would result in cheaper medicines for the Filipino people.
Of course, let’s face it, these multinationals would not be able to exercise such power without the cooperation of Filipinos themselves, in particular some members of the medical profession and some members of Congress. The American multinationals also have in their arsenal some very high-priced lobbyists, including former high-ranking US Embassy officials.
All these require a lot of money -- either directly in cash, or converted to in-kind contributions (financing hotel and travel expenditures, underwriting seminars and conferences) or for lawsuits and temporary restraining orders when all else fails. Moreover, they don’t seem to hesitate to apply outright intimidation techniques; threats to withhold supplies to drugstores that do not “cooperate” with them have also been used.
A few examples of how the pharmaceutical power is exercised:
That the Generics Law of 1988 was passed at all is not for want of trying on the part of the pharmaceutical industry to block it, including the use of the Philippine Medical Association in the fight, but because of the perseverance of Alran Bengzon, who was health secretary at the time.
One of the Trojan horses that got stuck in it was allowing doctors to prescribe their choice of branded medicine (a practice not allowed in US laws) together with the generic prescription. And this is what most doctors in private practice in the Philippines do. That they seem to have very cozy relationships with drug companies is perhaps due to the fact that they get a lot of freebies, which are ultimately paid for by the Filipino consumer: 20 percent of the price paid by Filipinos for their medicine is used by pharmaceuticals to pay for “promotions,” i.e., expenses incurred for sponsoring doctors’ foreign trips, seminars, conferences, as well as ads and other endorsements.
Then there was the attempt 10 years later, even as the generics law was perceived to have fallen by the wayside, of then-secretary of trade and industry Mar Roxas to initiate “parallel importation,” that is, buying branded, off-patent (i.e., the patents held by the drug companies had already expired) medicines from India that were selling there at a fraction of Philippine prices. Roxas was reacting to studies which showed how Filipinos were paying much higher prices for essential medicines than their Asian and Western counterparts.
Ang local auto industry,oligopoly. Ang local oil industry, oligopoly. pati ba naman gamot.......hayyyy........
Re: Medicines are very expensive in the Philippines
What would you expect? Sa med reps na lang, talagang galante sila makuha lang ang favor ng isang consultant and even mga residents pa lang. Ilang daang pasyente ang hawak ng isang consultant? Ang lakas mag sponsor ng mga pharma sa mga events ng various specialties. Natural kailangang bawiin yan.
Hopefully ma pasa nga yang batas na yan.
__________________ There can be no tyrants where there are no slaves.
-Jose Rizal
Re: Medicines are very expensive in the Philippines
parang bigla ko naalala yung narinig kong balita nung mga nagdaang araw... 1000 medreps daw mawawalan ng trabaho pag napasa yung bill na to para maging batas....
e ano naman kung 1000 medreps mawalan ng trabaho kumpara naman sa milyong milyong Pilipino na naghihirap sa pabgili ng mga gamot na to...
Re: Medicines are very expensive in the Philippines
Quote:
Originally Posted by putalittlemore
parang bigla ko naalala yung narinig kong balita nung mga nagdaang araw... 1000 medreps daw mawawalan ng trabaho pag napasa yung bill na to para maging batas....
e ano naman kung 1000 medreps mawalan ng trabaho kumpara naman sa milyong milyong Pilipino na naghihirap sa pabgili ng mga gamot na to...
Correct!!!Dapat sa Pfizer na yan e...sobrang mahal ng gamot nila.....parang may ginto sa loob......
Re: Medicines are very expensive in the Philippines
Medicines can be cheap
By Cielito Habito
Inquirer
Last updated 07:44pm (Mla time) 08/12/2007
The way medicines are priced in this country, an injustice that has plagued us Filipinos for far too long. We pay up to 45 times what people in other countries are paying for exactly the same drugs, manufactured by exactly the same multinational pharmaceutical companies. There are hard data on this compiled by Philippine International Trading Corp. (PITC), showing such glaring price differentials for drugs needed for anything from the common cold to hypertension. Why must the parents of an asthmatic child in the Philippines pay twice as much as what Thais need to pay for the very same inhaler by the same company? Or a Filipino heart patient pay about 45 times what a Pakistani pays for the same maintenance drug? Is it any surprise that the state of public health in the Philippines is significantly worse than other countries of similar income level? Contestability
The 1988 Generics Law sought to correct this injustice by giving Filipinos much cheaper unbranded alternatives for expensive drugs. But because that law had been substantially watered down by the time it passed Congress, and does not help with drugs that are patented, it has done little to change the situation even after almost 20 years in force.
The cheaper medicines bill that Sen. Mar Roxas has been pushing since the 13th Congress, against a formidable lobby by the big drug companies, would bring the battle forward by providing contestability (translation: more competition) in the drugs market.
Eliminating competition
The principle behind the bill is rooted in a basic law in economics: more competition is better than less, or none at all. On the other hand, the patent system is meant, quite simply, to eliminate all competition for a certain product.
....The case of big drug companies, unnecessarily huge profits via unfair pricing practices may have been made, literally at the expense of large numbers of human lives. Markets work
All we need, in fact, is to permit more competition, as the Roxas bill would do.
Our country's positive experience in providing more competition in markets where there previously was none speaks for itself. Most prominent examples have been in telecommunications and domestic airline services. Deliberate moves to open these industries to competition in the 1990s unleashed dynamic growth, lowered prices and improved quality, all to the benefit of consumers and thus, the wider population. We now have the opportunity to do the same for the drug industry, promising even far greater benefits to the multitude of Filipinos. It's about time we finally took it. Comments welcome at "linkart" href="mailto:[Only registered and activated users can see links. ]">[Only registered and activated users can see links. ] u
Re: Medicines are very expensive in the Philippines
Ang may kasalanan din ay ang mga doktor na nag papabili sa mga malaking pharma company. form of corruption din yan. may conscience ba ang mga doctor na yan? don't think so kasi they have big egos.
Pharma companies tulad ng Unilab ay nagpapasok ng mga possibly tainted drugs galing Tsina. far fetched? May nagsabi po sa kin sa loob na ginagawa nila yun at hindi fully tested ang mga droga. Ngayon may konsyensya ba ang Pharma companies? Saan niyo palagay nakukuha nila ang malaking budget nila para kunin sila Aga, Juday, etc pang endorse. Kitang kita sa EDSA billboards na maraming pera pumapasok sa kanila.
At ang tanong sinong namamatay? Hindi ang mga taga Pharma companies kundi ang kapwa nilang Pilipino. Murder ba ang tawag dun?
Medicines are very expensive in the Philippines
Dapat sa Pfizer na yan e...sobrang mahal ng gamot nila.....parang may ginto sa loob......
(Pero, masaya raw ang mga tao rito....
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