The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has given the state of Colorado permission to
import lower-cost prescription drugs from Canada. The Colorado Department of Health Care Policy & Financing outlined a plan to import drugs that will reduce costs while ensuring public health and safety, according to the agency.
"I'm excited that the FDA has finally approved our application to import lower-cost prescription drugs from Canada, a major step in our fight to save Coloradans money on prescription drug costs," Gov. Jared Polis said in a news release. "Now more than ever, we need to call on drug manufacturers to step up to the plate and stop ripping off consumers with inflated drug costs by putting profits over people. Enough is enough. There's important work ahead to get this done and save people money, but this approval is the vital first step."
Colorado has been working on its drug importation program since 2019, when the Legislature passed a bill enabling the state health department to pursue this affordability strategy. The approved application indicates that the program has the potential to save Coloradans $46 million over three years through lower insurance premiums and out-of-pocket expenses, based on the drugs provided through the state's application. The state also is able to work with all willing manufacturers to secure savings on additional drugs.
"This FDA approval for Colorado's drug importation program has been a long time coming," said Gretchen Hammer, the health agency's executive director. "Now it is time for drug manufacturers to engage with the state, remove the prohibitions they have put on Canadian manufacturers and be part of the prescription drug affordability solution."
Several other states, including Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Texas, North Dakota and Wisconsin, have submitted or pursued similar proposals with the FDA in recent years. However, hospital pharmacy groups have raised concerns.
"The Canadian market cannot supply anywhere close to the amount of medication needed to bring down U.S. drug prices," Tom Kraus, vice president of government relations for the American Society of Health-System Pharmacists, said in response to a similar program in Florida. "We need politicians to focus on real solutions, like ending pharmacy benefit manager rebates that undermine competition and discourage use of lower-cost medications, and allowing pharmacists to substitute clinically equivalent biologic medications, like they do for generic small molecule drugs."
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