Canada has a lack of transparency about Big Pharma’s payments to health-care providers and organizations. Disclosure is voluntary, and there’s no central data on even the few companies that do report.
A new study has found no evidence that people’s beliefs in conspiracy theories increase over time. They can even change their minds – just not that often.
Drug development takes a great deal of time, money and effort. While future profits play a big factor in which diseases gets prioritized, advocacy and research incentives can also tilt the scale.
Pharmaceutical and insurance industries that could lose profit through lower drug prices are not happy that a pharmacare bill is planned for fall. They are speaking out and mobilizing their allies.
Canadians pay very high drug costs, but Canada also does not receive the same economic benefits from pharmaceutical industry investments as other countries do.
The federal government’s proposed Agile Licensing drug approval regulations mean Canada will have less information about the risks of new medicines, and higher costs.
Health Canada continues to monitor newly approved drugs to determine if the benefits identified in the pre-market trials hold up to further scrutiny. Canadians need better access to that information.
Some commercial products and practices are directly linked to avoidable ill health, planetary damage, and social and health inequity. Large transnational corporations are especially to blame.
The pharma industry claims lower prescription drug prices will mean less access to new medication for Canadians. It’s an old threat that pits profits against patients’ rights to affordable drugs.
The Medicines Patent Pool was created to promote public health, facilitating generic licensing for patented drugs that treat diseases predominantly affecting low- and middle-income countries.
A major lesson from the COVID-19 pandemic is the need to decolonize transnational governance so that the world is better able to handle both future and current global crises.
The Purdue Pharma settlement is paltry compared to costs of the opioid crisis. Without major changes to pharma industry regulation, there is little reason to think a similar crisis won’t occur again.
Ronald Labonte, L’Université d’Ottawa/University of Ottawa
Waiving patent rights on COVID-19 vaccines and drugs is still crucial to ensure access globally, but the waiver on the table at the June World Trade Organization meeting doesn’t do the job.
Drug repurposing can redeem failed treatments and squeeze out new uses from others. But many pharmaceutical companies are hesitant to retool existing drugs without a high return on investment.
Changes to Canada’s Patented Medicine Prices Review Board regulations have been postponed for a fourth time in two years as Canadians continue to pay some of the highest drug prices in the world.
Professor of Bioethics & Medicine, Sydney Health Ethics, Haematologist/BMT Physician, Royal North Shore Hospital and Director, Praxis Australia, University of Sydney