LOS ANGELES (AP) A rolling protest against high drug prices
will haul senior citizens from Southern California to Canada to buy
pharmaceuticals.
About 25 people were scheduled to depart Los Angeles on Monday
aboard the ``Rx Express'' and arrive Wednesday in Vancouver.
Elderly passengers from as far south as San Diego were to ride two
chartered private cars attached to an Amtrak train.
Protesters plan to take the train to Klamath Falls, Ore., and
would likely ride a chartered bus the rest of the way, said Jerry
Flanagan of the Santa Monica-based Foundation for Taxpayer and
Consumer Rights.
Advocates hoped the Rx Express trip would dramatize the soaring
cost of prescription drugs and promote a change in federal law to
allow Medicare and other programs to buy drugs in bulk to reduce
their cost to members.
Prescription drug imports are banned by the federal government
unless the secretary of Health and Human Services certifies their
safety, which has not been done. The Food and Drug Administration
has opposed prescription drug imports because it says it cannot
guarantee the drugs' safety.
There has been a groundswell of demand by Americans, however,
because of skyrocketing drug costs. Certain pharmaceuticals cost a
fourth as much in Canada as they do if purchased in the United
States due to government price controls.
For instance, a three-month supply of the cholesterol-lowering
drug Lipitor costs $214 in the United States and $162 in Canada.
President Bush on Aug. 18 said pressure is building in Congress
to allow Canadian drug imports but it still is unclear whether the
drugs would be safe.
People on both sides of the issue say there is growing,
bipartisan support in the House and Senate to make it legal for
drugs to be imported, but Republican leaders so far this year have
not allowed a vote.
Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry has said he favors
allowing the federal government to negotiate better drug prices
through Medicare and imported drugs.
(Copyright 2004 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)