A chara, - Hopefully, the publication last week of the Oireachtas report on the adverse side effects of pharmaceuticals marks the beginning of a long-overdue public debate in this country about if and how the imperatives of profit-making and promoting health can be reconciled in Government pharmaceutical policy.
Defensive reactions to the report from the Irish Medicines Board (IMB) and the Irish Pharmaceutical Healthcare Association (IPHA), as reported by John Downes (May 1st) suggest all is well in the existing regulatory regime and consequently such a debate would serve no purpose. For example, in response to the Oireachtas report's recommendation to change the system whereby the IMB derives its funding primarily from industry fees (thereby positioning drug companies rather than members of the public as the statutory agency's "clients"), the IMB asserts that such a funding arrangement is typical of drug regulation agencies internationally.
This is undoubtedly an accurate observation: over the past two decades in which neo-liberalism and the drive for "competitiveness" have informed much policy making, there has been a move towards industry-funded drug regulation authorities in many countries. However, just because a policy reflects global trends does not mean it is a good one and that it prioritises public interests.
There has been widespread opposition to such funding arrangements internationally. Marcia Angell, former editor in chief of the New England Journal of Medicine, has argued that changes in the US regulatory system since the 1980s, particularly legislation that made the Food and Drug Administration dependent for its income on fees paid by industry, resulted in the regulatory authority becoming "big pharma's handmaiden".
Let's hope those who are happy with how things are do not succeed in stifling the debate that this Oireachtas report has the potential to generate.- Mise le meas,
ORLA O'DONOVAN, Department of Applied Social Studies, University College Cork.