Re: Bush: Stop Online Drug Sales

indeed! the 'defunding' of that dept [which is charged with certifying
factories] within fda is nothing short of hypocrisy

Mike Berkowitz wrote:

On Tue, 11 Mar 2008 23:46:48 GMT, "Paul T. Holland"
<pholland@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

there are however, many other reasons that the myriad of online
operations are problematic

one primary reason being lack of quality assurance, in fact, lack of
even getting what is purported to be sold at all

a reality is that literally thousands of these websites [unfortuantely
the majority [imo] of them] simply aren't connected to any 'real'
establishment, pharmacy, or doctor at all -

they are interlocked pill mills sending out orders of unproved
provenance or origin.

rather than protest the intercession of authority, how about calling for
better ways to actually know who, what, where? whly sohould any legit
operation be registered anonymously? with no street address, real phone
number [vs a phone clearing operation], of corporate tracking?

we expect and demand proper controls of brick and mortar pharm's - yet
we don't see it with the majority of these online outfits.

yes, there are a few legitimate ones - a few.

but the fact is that of the many thousands of websites, only those very
few are what they say they are.

what is wrong with valid controls to protect the public from the
outfight fraud that we all know is rampant in the industry?

shoot, the fda isn't even able to protect the supply of heparin from
contamination and that is from known factories overseas, the pills
coming thru the mail from online pharms could - and are - coming from
undocumented sources, under conditons that no one is monitoring for
safety.

frankly, imo, if these online operations had to operate with the same
controls as brick and mortar ones, i don't think you see the kind of
witch hunt that goes on. there wouldn't be any questions then.

there has always been provision for online outfits to register witht he
gov - and conform to operating standards long in place - to date less
than 20 have ever bothered...

not surprisingly, those that are registered have never be subjected to
the investigations that we read about - and those that do get busted are
found to be scam/sham operations...

imo, the majority were simply looking to operate 'between the lines' and
thus are the real cause of the majority of the perceived problems.

those 'drug warriers' wouldn't have anyone to campaign against if those
in the industry were as interested in solving the problem as they were
in trying to portray those in gov. as being evil. i'm not saying that
there hasn't been problems with the way fda/dea operate, nor am i saying
that there hasn't been [imo] abuse of office with political motivation
-

frankly, if those interested in online operations thought it thru - and
based their operations on the same model as the 'mail order' operations
- there just wouldn't 'be' a problem worthy of draconian gov measures

this boils down to whther someone receives a valid script for
medications, and who fills it - nothing more or less.

but it IS two separate issues - lumping them together only makes it that
much more diff. to resolve both


Juba wrote:

Mike Berkowitz <mkberk@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message:
l636t3hqeekb7bh9s89j9t3kod1ibivq7f@xxxxxxx,
I can't even get my prescription filled by my health plan's online
pharmacy in CA let alone a drug mill pharmacy. Do you really think
online pharmacies are the major source for legal but abused opiates in
the US? I am probably naive about this one but it just doesn't make
sense. Then again bush never makes sense.

Mike

I agree that the online pharmacies are NOT the major source of legal or
illegal abused opiates. Drugs diverted from pharmaceutical companies and
drugs that came from brick and mortar pharmacies are the major sources.

Online pharmacies were made the boogy-man after a few well-publicized
deaths of minors who bought opiates online. We saw the mothers
testifying in front of Congress about how it was everyone's fault but
theirs and their little darlings, and that lead to a crackdown. The
crackdown shut down all pharmacies that were prescribing opiates with
little more than a doctor's rubber stamp and now the only ones who are
still in business in the US require (at a minimum) medical records.

And yet we still hear over and over again how kids can supposedly buy
opiates online with no problem at all. But if you check the online
forums where people trade info about online pharmacies, there's no talk
of drug abuse like you might see in alt.drugs or alt.drugs.hard. All the
people who contribute to these forums talk about their chronic pain.
People who live in rural areas where the doctors are cowards who won't
prescribe opiates are able to send their medical records to an online
doctor who will prescribe painkillers, because they can justify it based
on the information in someone's medical records.

For many people who suffer daily from chronic pain, online pharmacies
are the only source of pain relief. And of course that's exactly why the
drug warriors want to shut it all down. Apparently there are a lot of
people who can't deal with the idea that somewhere someone might be
taking a pill that they don't really need. And so they are willing to
consign millions of people to a painful existence and an early death in
their vain attempts to stop the tiny minority who abuse prescription
drugs. Even if they could pull it off, the tiny minority would simply
switch to abusing something else.

--
Juba
www.masterjuba.com

It appears the QA aspect of medications is not limited to just
'online' sources. Many so called reputable companies have contracted
with Chinese companies to supply all or part of the raw ingredients
for their prescription drugs. These plants are not well inspected so
bad medication is finding its way into our homes.

Mike
.

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