- Chalk up another profitable victory for those promoting
the legal drugging of America's children -- also known as the good folks
of the pharmaceutical industry. Earlier this month, a federal judge struck
down a Food and Drug Administration regulation that required drug makers
to test medicines routinely given to children.
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- As a result, America's legal drug pushers are once again
free to offer their potent concoctions for our kids' consumption without
having to prove that they are safe or effective for pediatric use.
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- This is no small matter, given the skyrocketing number
of children being prescribed heaping helpings of powerful mood-altering
drugs. For instance, 1.5 million kids are currently taking Prozac and its
equivalents even though the FDA hasn't approved these drugs for use by
anyone under 18.
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- In making his ruling, U.S. District Judge Henry Kennedy,
Jr. made it clear that the problem wasn't the FDA's attempt to protect
our kids, but Congress' failure to authorize them to do so. He pointed
out that earlier this year Congress considered but passed on the chance
to require drug companies to make sure that products designed for grown-ups
but regularly given to kids are, in fact, safe for children to take.
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- Instead, our elected representatives -- legislating under
the influence (LUI) of the $18 million drug companies have donated to congressional
campaigns this election cycle -- approved an industry handout, offering
"financial incentives" to companies willing to take the trouble
to find out if their products are dangerous for kids. Rewarding companies
that bother to behave with ordinary civic responsibility is becoming a
bad habit for Washington and it reveals their scary baseline assumption
that, left alone, big business can never be expected to do the right thing.
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- Sens. Christopher Dodd, Mike DeWine, and Hillary Clinton
are cosponsoring a new bill that would supersede the federal court's ruling
and give the FDA legal authority to require drug testing for children.
"Children will be harmed if we don't pass this legislation,"
warns DeWine. So far, the troika's efforts to bring the bill to a vote
have been thwarted by the drug companies' loyal beneficiaries in the Senate.
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- But Capitol Hill is not the only pharmaceutical industry-friendly
place in Washington. The drug companies also appear to have found an ally
inside the highest echelons of the FDA.
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- In keeping with the White House's habit of assigning
foxes to guard the henhouses they used to stalk -- including the tres-vulpine
Harvey Pitt and Gale Norton -- last summer the president appointed lawyer
Daniel Troy as the FDA's general counsel. While in private practice, Troy
had successfully challenged the agency's power to regulate drug companies
-- particularly the companies' ability to freely promote and market their
products.
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- It probably shouldn't come as too much of a surprise
then that, from his lofty post, Troy has overseen a dramatic decrease in
the number of drug companies that have been reprimanded for running false
or misleading commercials -- even as the drug ads filling our TV screens
and magazines have multiplied. Of course, it could just be that the drug
companies have all joined the Boy Scouts and are now being meticulously
honest and trustworthy.
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- One of the pharmaceutical industry's weapons of choice
in its fight to free itself from federal oversight has been the First Amendment,
a tactic once favored by none other than Daniel Troy. Groups aligned with
the industry have successfully used free speech arguments to convince courts
to strike down regulations barring drug companies from advertising so-called
"compounded drugs" and from telling doctors about unapproved
uses for its products -- such as giving adult drugs to children. The founding
fathers would have had to pop a lot of pills to conceive of this perversion
of the Bill of Rights.
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- Reeling from these rulings and under increasing pressure
from the drug industry, this spring the FDA invited interested parties
to comment on whether any of its other rules raise "First Amendment
issues". Among the flurry of feedback the agency received was a suggestion
from the ever-helpful gang at Pfizer that the FDA do away with those pesky
rules requiring drug companies to list a product's side effects and replace
them with a cheerful reminder that since all medications come with some
risks, patients should always check with their doctor before taking them.
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- Makes sense. Why bother letting consumers know that downing
a brightly colored, widely advertised little pill might cause nervousness,
anxiety, insomnia, restlessness, suicidal thoughts, self mutilation, manic
behavior, and bad breath when a simple and direct "Consult your doctor"
-- or rather "consult your overworked, underpaid, HMO-tormented physician"
-- will suffice? Who on earth takes a prescription drug without consulting
their doctor? It's not like patients can prescribe the drugs for themselves,
although now that I've said it, I fear I've given drug companies and Daniel
Troy an idea for the ultimate regulatory rollback.
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- This kind of self-serving, the-public-be-damned thinking
is precisely why we need strong drug industry oversight in Washington,
not appointees and politicians beholden to their deep-pocket patrons. Especially
when our children's health and well-being are at stake.
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- © 2002 Working Assets. All rights reserved.
- http://www.workingforchange.com/article.cfm?ItemID=14013
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