Prescription Drugs are a part of every day life here in America mostly because of the Federal Drug and Administration and Big PHARMA. Anytime a person has a cold or any other sickness they go to the doctor and that doctor gives them prescription drugs. However, there are patients suffering from worse conditions that must pay a very high premium to receive the medications that they need. Here in the United States those prescription drugs may cost very high and so they look elsewhere. This is not unheard of and has been happening for years now, but the FDA would like to stop this because it can lead to things such as counterfeiting, drugs of the wrong potency, which could lead to life threatening reactions. However, the other side argues that …show more content…
The costs of medications have continued to rise out of control in the United States causing a billion dollar industry to continue to grow at the expense of the sick people the products they sell are supposed to help. Pharmaceutical companies in the U.S. charges twice the amount for their medications than other countries such as Canada, the United Kingdoms, New Zealand and Australia. By allowing the citizens to import their prescription drugs it would as Senator Keith Ellison has stated, “Allow Americans to spend more time focusing on their health and less time worrying about how they’ll pay for their prescriptions ().” When discussing this importation the FDA often makes the argument that the drugs being important are just not safe, however no drug is one hundred percent safe. Many of the drugs the FDA approves have side effects that are fairly significant or require another drug to dull the side effects (ashp). In these cases though the FDA has weighed the pros and cons to the public and deemed them safe. Along those same lines the U.S. could use reimportation by approving sources overseas that are ok for the general population to obtain medications from because they have been vetted. The FDA argues that this is what they do, however this process would more focus on catching counterfeiters rather than illegal drugs thereby eliminating the fear of receiving medications that are