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HHS Creates Task Force to Study Drug Importation

By ALM Staff | Law Journal Newsletters |
April 02, 2004

Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy G. Thompson announced on Feb. 26 that a task force had been created to advise and assist HHS in determining whether and how drug importation into the United States could be conducted safely. The Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement and Modernization Act of 2003 (MMA) directed the HHS to lead a comprehensive study to be completed by December 2004, gauging both the positive and negative effects that can be expected on the health of American patients, on medical costs and on the development of new medicines if pharmaceutical products are imported into the United States from countries with lower drug prices.

In the MMA, Congress directed HHS to address, among other things, the current limitations on the ability to certify the safety of imported drugs, the vulnerabilities in pharmaceutical distribution chains that could compromise safety, the availability of anti-counterfeiting technologies and their costs, and the willingness of foreign countries to help ensure the drugs shipped to the United States are safe, genuine and meet FDA standards.

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