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MAY 2002 SPECIAL EDITION |
SPECIAL PHARMACEUTICAL/RURAL HEALTH ISSUE!
Open Letter to All US Senators and US Representatives
By
Kermit W. Richardson, President
National Grange of the Order of Patrons of Husbandry
"Don't Upset The Applecart!" |
Dear
US Senator and US Representative:
I would like to bring to your attention a major new health-care crisis is threatening
millions of Americans who live and work in rural America. It would disproportionately
affect seniors, the very young, and persons suffering from chronic diseases who
reside in our nation's farming communities and towns. It is not a crisis driven
by infection, epidemic, environmental factors, or even personal lifestyle choices.
Unless we act, it could ultimately degrade the quality of life for every American,
but it will be felt first, and perhaps most profoundly, by those in rural communities.
Eventually, it could cost hundreds of billions of dollars, cause hundreds of millions
of hours of lost time, and extract an unknown toll in suffering and misery. The
National Grange, this nation's oldest general farm and rural public interest organization,
is asking for your assistance to confront this crisis. The
crisis stems from proposals now before Congress, such as S.812 the Schumer/McCain
bill, to amend current law to deny full patent protection to cutting-edge pharmaceutical
products that are about to come to market. Promoted as a way to "reduce" health-care
costs, instead, these proposals would disrupt both the availability of new medicines
and the introduction of lower-cost generic drugs. It is, furthermore, a blatant
attempt to expropriate intellectual property - property that has been created
by years of high-risk and high-cost research. Unless Congress acts to preserve
current law, this counter-productive policy would seriously undermine investment
in research and development for the life-saving medications, procedures, and cutting-edge
biotechnology that will be needed in the 21st century. And while all Americans
would feel the pain and discomfort from this loss of innovation, rural Americans
would feel the pain (often literally) the most.
To
understand why denying full pharmaceutical patent protection threatens to create
a health care crisis for rural America, it is first necessary to understand that
there are basically three pathways by which medical innovations reach patients.
Rural Americans, however, are at a distinct disadvantage along two of these three
pathways, when compared to urban and suburban citizens, because of their relative
geographic isolation. The
first pathway for medical innovation is through the knowledge and skills of trained
medical professionals, such as doctors. Today, rural communities suffer from chronic
shortages of nearly all types of medical professionals. Fewer trained medical
professionals who can deliver state-of-the-art medical care results in lower quality
of care. It also increases the cost and burden on the rural sick and infirm who
must travel farther to obtain quality care. The
second medical innovation pathway is through the use of state-of-the-art medical
equipment. Many of the most valuable pieces of medical equipment in modern treatment
facilities are expensive, immobile, require skilled technicians to operate, and
have high overhead costs. They are cost-effective investments only when extensively
used, which means they are often unavailable in rural America. The
third avenue for delivering state-of-the art medical care to patients is through
new medications and pharmacological products. Compared to the other two pathways,
medicines are relatively inexpensive, have low overhead and maintenance costs,
and are easy to transport directly to patients regardless of where they live.
Rural patients have access to the latest innovation in pharmaceutical technology
on the same day it is introduced to the rest of the country. Thus, for much of
rural America, quality medical care and medicine are basically one and the same.
It is, therefore,
of grave concern to the National Grange that some members of Congress are seriously
considering changes to current law that could disrupt both the availability of
new medicines and the introduction of lower-cost generic drugs. For almost two
decades, the American consumer has benefited from the provisions of the Hatch-Waxman
Act, ground-breaking legislation that dramatically expanded the generic drug market.
Since its enactment in 1984, more than 8,000 generic drug petitions have been
filed with the FDA and generic drugs now account for almost 50 percent of all
pharmaceutical sales. The
1984 law also established a delicate and highly successful balance between the
patent rights of the innovator companies and the generic manufacturers' need to
bring products to market as quickly as possible. The result is that investment
in the research and development of new medicines has increased dramatically over
the past 18 years from just under $4 billion in the late 1980s to over $30 billion
today. This is a medical life-line for rural America - a life-line that cannot
and should not be compromised. In
agricultural terms, the harvest created by Hatch-Waxman has been enormous. Consumers
have benefited, the generic drug industry has prospered, and the innovator pharmaceutical
companies have had the right incentives to continue to develop new and more effective
medicines, medicines that are desperately needed to bring quality health care
to rural America. The National Grange needs your assistance to help alleviate
this new medical crisis that is threatening rural America. We urge you to promptly
reject S.812 and other short sighted proposals to amend current law to deny full
patent protection to new pharmaceuticals. Any attempt to amend the current Hatch-Waxman
Act would upset the successful pharmaceutical applecart that has delivered a bumper
crop of positive medical products to all Americans but especially to those living
in rural America.
Sincerely, Kermit
W. Richardson
President National Grange of the Order of Patrons of Husbandry
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