POLITICS - FDA Shields Drug Companies

Here we go again. The Bush Whitehouse at work protecting big-money over protecting consumers (the people).

In a UseNet post by Evelyn Pringle, "FDA shields drug companies from lawsuits" she has something significant to say. The following are excerpts.

She begins with.....

Last month, the FDA revealed its latest protective policy for drug companies in a statement that said people who believe they have been injured by drugs approved by the FDA should not be allowed to sue drug companies in state courts.

"We think that if your company complies with the FDA processes, if you bring forward the benefits and risks of your drug, and let your information be judged through a process with highly trained scientists, you should not be second-guessed by state courts that don't have the same scientific knowledge," said Scott Gottlieb, the FDA's deputy commissioner for medical and scientific affairs.

The agency's assertion of "federal preemption" was included as a preamble to its new drug labeling guidelines.

The claim of preemption was quickly attacked by trial lawyers and members of Congress as another effort by the Bush administration to limit the public's ability to bring and win lawsuits, according to the January 19, 2006 Washington Post.

"Eliminating the rights of individuals to hold negligent drug companies accountable puts patients in even more danger than they already are in from drug company executives that put profits before safety," said Ken Suggs, president of the Association of Trial Lawyers of America.

...which in itself says allot.

"The fact that the drug industry can get the FDA to rewrite the rules so that CEOs can escape accountability for putting dangerous and deadly drugs on the market is the scariest example yet of how much control these big corporations have over our political process," Mr Suggs told the Post.

In response to the FDA's announcement, Senator Kennedy issued a statement that said: "It's a typical abuse by the Bush Administration -- take a regulation to improve the information that doctors and patients receive about prescription drugs and turn it into a protection against liability for the drug industry."

The National Conference of State Legislatures, a bipartisan group that represents state lawmakers, accused the FDA of trying to seize authority that it did not have.

Over the past several years, lawmakers have been turning up the heat on both the FDA and the pharmaceutical industry in response to their combined failure to reveal problems found during studies conducted on top selling drugs like Vioxx.

At one point, Senator Charles Grassley (R-Iowa), Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, came right out and accused the FDA of suppressing studies in order to protect pharmaceutical industry profits and the careers of certain FDA officials.

With all the other examples of the drug industry putting dangerous medications out on the market then we find out, after numerous consumers die or become ill, that the drug should not be on the market. Why, the FDA is more in the drug-promotion industry than consumer protection. No matter what they say, protection of the consumer is much, much lower priority than promoting and protecting the big drug companies.