| WASHINGTON, D.C. – Co-chair of the House of Representatives’ Affordable Medicines Taskforce, U.S. Congressman Marion Berry (D-AR, 1st) hosted nationally recognized industry expert Dr. John Abramson today to discuss options in reforming the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) processes for drug approval and the pharmaceutical industry’s influence over the publication of drug studies.
Over the last several months, details came to light demonstrating problems within the FDA as the safety of blockbuster drugs such as Vioxx and Celebrex were questioned. As a result of some of those findings, Vioxx was taken off the market.
“The FDA is charged with ensuring the safety of our nation’s drug supply, if they are failing at their job we risk losing much more than political points,” Berry said. “The pharmaceutical companies seem far too involved with what should be an unbiased process. From study’s conducted within the FDA to journals written by drug company-sponsored scientists, it seems the focus has shifted from patients to profits and we must bring the attention back where it belongs.”
A practicing family physician for over twenty years, Dr. Abramson constantly found himself on the receiving end of endless drug company pitches. In an attempt to remain unbiased and helpful to his patients, Dr. Abramson carefully scrutinized the underlying study data for today’s most popular drugs. Through his research, Dr. Abramson found a disturbing trend: clinical studies presented in even the most respected medical journals were often biased by drug company sponsorship and the medical information available in the published studies often misrepresented the actual findings.
In his book, “Overdosed-America: The Broken Promise of American Medicine,” Dr. Abramson examines these relationships and briefed Members of Congress today to further the legislative process and attempt to break the industry’s hold on the scientists who approve and study their drugs.
Today’s briefing represents another step in the efforts of Congressman Berry to lower the costs of prescription drugs. Just this year, Berry has sponsored or co-sponsored 2 bills to allow for reimportation of prescription drugs (HR 328 and HR 700), a bill to allow the government to negotiate drug prices with the pharmaceutical companies on behalf of more than 40 million Medicare beneficiaries (HR 752), and a bill to increase criminal penalties for drug company CEO’s who conceal evidence of adverse reactions with their drugs (HR 870). |
