Healthy Skepticism Library item: 5737

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Publication type: news

Breusch J.
Tough curbs on drug companies' treats for doctors
Australian Financial Review 2006 Jul 27
http://afr.com/

Full text:

Tough curbs on drug companies’ treats for doctors
Author: John Breusch
Date: 27/07/2006
The Financial Review, Page: 3

Drug companies will have to reveal details of every dinner and function
they put on for doctors under tough rules designed to expose the extent
of largesse in the industry.

In a bid to tackle complaints that pharmaceutical giants are going too
far in their efforts to encourage doctors to prescribe their medicines,
the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission yesterday issued a
new code of conduct that goes further than many advocates for change had
anticipated.

Doctors last night criticised the changes, saying they could jeopardise
legitimate efforts to educate practitioners about new medicines.

The existing rules aim to curb the largesse of drug companies, stating
that meals put on for doctors “should not be extravagant” and that
hospitality should be “secondary to the educational purpose of the meeting”.

But amid repeated revelations of doctors being flown across the country
for lavish dinners at the expense of pharmaceutical firms, the ACCC has
acknowledged that enforcement of the self-regulated code – which relies
on complaints by members of the public – has been inadequate.

In a draft released this year, the ACCC proposed instituting spot
checks, whereby drug companies would have to reveal what entertaining
they had done in a randomly picked month. The final version of the code,
released yesterday, goes further, requiring that the cost of every
function be detailed in monthly reports that will be posted on the internet.

“The condition aims to assist scrutiny of sponsorship activities of
pharmaceutical companies by the general public,” ACCC chairman Graeme
Samuel said.

“The ACCC believes the enhanced transparency will bring about greater
accountability on the part of pharmaceutical companies in relation to
their sponsorship activities and will enable the public to assess
whether the code is being effectively enforced.”

Industry group Medicines Australia said it would study the disclosure
rules before issuing a response.

But Australian Medical Association president Mukesh Haikerwal said
doctors were entitled to expect an incentive to attend an awareness
function outside work hours.

The new rules “will have a detrimental effect on what’s trying to be
achieved from an educational point of view”, he said.

A leading critic of drug company practices, LaTrobe University School of
Public Health senior lecturer Ken Harvey, welcomed the new rules.

“One of the problems has been that when you have a complaint-driven
code, the people being wined and dined are really not anxious to
complain,” he said.

Dr Harvey said the companies’ aggressive marketing had led doctors to
prescribe branded medicines rather than their potentially cheaper
generic versions, which had contributed to the growth in the cost of the
pharmaceutical benefits scheme.

The federal government is in talks with drug companies and pharmacists
about proposed cost-cutting reforms for the PBS, which Treasury’s 2002
Intergenerational Report identified as one of the main causes of an
expected blow-out in public spending over coming decades.

But the Pharmacy Guild released figures yesterday showing that as a
proportion of gross domestic product, the PBS was now at its lowest
level since the release of the Intergenerational Report, and that
spending on the scheme was falling in real terms.