E-drug: The importance of DTCs and regulation
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[This posting follows the message about AZ and me-too drugs in Sweden
and emphasises the importance of effective Drug and Therapeutics
Committees (DTCs) and regulation. BS]
Dear Atenio,
Your experience with DTC's sounds like a clear indication that they work!
Here, it turned out that AstraZeneca [AZ] was upset about other things, in
addition to the fact that Swedish DTC's recommend cheap drugs. AZ also
didn't like the prospect of stricter regulation of clinical trials. New
regulations scheduled to take effect in a few months will make it harder to
conduct marketing masquerading as research (seeding trials).
Of course, as you note, the macro level should not be neglected: we do want
the company to stay, employ people, pay tax, come up with useful
innovations, build know-how, etc. What we do not want is a situation where
they can blackmail society.
Actually, this reminds me of the arms trade argument that "if we don't sell
them guns, someone else will". When AZ threatens to leave Sweden, they
implicitly say "you have nasty DTCs so we go spend our money where there are
nice DTCs". The arguments are similar in that they assume the existence of
"someone" or "somewhere else".
Staffan Svensson, MD
Dept of Clinical Pharmacology
Sahlgren's Univ Hospital
Gothenburg, Sweden
staffan.svensson@pharm.gu.se
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