Justinian Lane

Let’s Band Together To Help Protect Pharmaceutical Companies From Frivolous Lawsuits

I was recently made aware of a growing problem in the United States that costs citizens billions of dollars, and potentially thousands of lives. Manufacturers of lifesaving drugs are routinely sued by greedy plaintiffs who want to stop those drugs from coming to market. From MSN:

“WASHINGTON - Drug companies increasingly are reaching legal settlements that delay the introduction of cheaper generic medicines and cheat Americans of billions of dollars a year in savings, federal regulators on Wednesday told lawmakers seeking to ban the agreements.

The Federal Trade Commission and others allege the settlements allow brand-name pharmaceutical companies to pay off would-be generic competitors, which then agree to delay introduction of their less costly but otherwise identical versions of the original medicines.”

I’d like to reach across the aisle to my friends on the other side of the tort reform movement and ask them to work with me to support legislation that will prohibit these dangerous agreements. Truly, nothing exemplifies putting profits before people than corporations who file frivolous lawsuits to prevent perfectly-safe drugs from coming to market.

Tort reformers often argue that frivolous and not-so-frivolous lawsuits against pharmaceutical companies delay or stop the introduction of potentially lifesaving drugs. In this case, the drugs are known to be safe, and the only reason to delay their introduction is for profit. Here’s an opportunity for tort reformers to prove that they really are sincerely concerned for the health of Americans, and not just for the health of Merck’s stock price.

We simply cannot let rapacious corporate executives prevent people from obtaining these lifesaving drugs at affordable prices. So I ask everyone to put the issue of tort reform aside for just a moment and contact your elected officials to demand that they support this legislation.

No matter if you call it Tort Reform or tort “reform” - I’ll work with you and your organization to fix this broken system.

Who’s with me?

Posted at 7:35 PM, Jan 17, 2007 in Civil Justice | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)