Saturday, February 24, 2007 Carvajal: A lobby by any other name By Orlando P. Carvajal Break Point
FRANKLY, I cannot figure out why a law has to be passed to allow the importation of cheaper medicines. I thought we were in a free economy where competition is promoted in order to bring the prices down. Why can’t some entrepreneur just import these medicines to keep the big foreign pharmaceutical companies honest about their prices?
Anyway, I am glad to learn of the cheaper medicines act because I spend P5,000 a month on medicines to treat some health conditions that come with age. I am glad even as I wonder why a cheaper medicines act has to be enacted into law to bring the prices of medicines down in this country.
It could mean there was a previous law protecting the expensive medicines sold by big foreign pharmaceutical companies. Either that or there is a mechanism whereby these drug companies enjoy de facto monopoly or protection on medicines, hence the high prices.
I find it, therefore, less than candid for the spokesman of big pharmaceutical companies to claim that their sending a note to Rep. Teddy Boy Locsin did not constitute a lobby against the cheaper medicines bill. If they were for cheaper medicines, then in the first place they didn’t need to be in Congress when the bill was deliberated on. If, as they claim, they just wanted to make sure the floodgates are not opened for the entry of counterfeit drugs, then the best way to do that is to bring the prices of their genuine drugs down.
In business, one of the rules for survival and growth is to make it hard for the competition to enter your market. And one way to keep competition away is not to be greedy and price your product as reasonably low as you can. This way competition will have a hard time entering the market since they might not make money if they are forced to lower their price to successfully encroach on your territory.
Yet the big pharmaceutical companies priced their products so high as to invite competition. But wonder of wonders competition never came and a bill now has to be passed to allow the importation of cheaper medicines. And the big pharmaceutical companies are lobbying against it, their claims to the contrary notwithstanding.
The fact of the matter is that the big pharmaceutical companies are against the cheaper medicines act. In Congress the other day, they were clutching at straws and saw the lack of quorum as the only way to stall the proceedings so they can plan their next move. They don’t want the prices down so they are lobbying against the bill. A lobby by any other name is still a lobby. I hope our legislators will vote in favor of the millions who can’t afford the expensive drugs sold by big foreign pharmaceutical companies.
