President Obama Issues Executive Order To Ease Shortages in Vital Medicines

Posted by Join Or DIE on October 31, 2011

Whatever Obama does, the Republicans will say it’s the wrong thing to do … but wouldn’t it be something if he dealt with the root of the problem (Big Pharma)? Lara Salahi reports for ABC News:

While many advocates say President Obama’s executive order to reduce a dire shortage of life-saving hospital medications is an essential step, others say the order is not enough to stop price gouging by some pharmaceutical companies.

Essential cancer drugs have arguably taken the hardest hit. Hospitals have reported the worst shortage in nearly a decade of chemotherapy agents like doxorubicin.

The new order instructs the Food and Drug Administration to broaden reporting of potential drug shortages, expedite regulatory reviews that can help prevent shortages, and examine whether potential shortages have led to price gouging. The drug shortage has compromised or delayed care for some patients and may have led to otherwise preventable deaths.

Christopher W. Hansen, president of the American Cancer Society’s Cancer Action Network, applauded today’s order, saying in a statement that it would “allow government, industry, providers and the public to more systematically analyze and understand the causes of specific drug shortages as they occur, and to develop real-time solutions that are also needed to address the acute problems that cancer patients live with daily.”

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