Supporters of a new law allowing Nevadans to buy lower-priced prescription drugs from Canadian pharmacy suffered a setback on Tuesday with an adverse state attorney general’s opinion that favors this country’s pharmaceutical industry. Attorney General George Chanos said in the 19-page opinion that his office supports the idea of low-cost drugs – but it’s clear that state lawmakers also intended to ensure that the prescription drugs provided to the citizens of Nevada are both safe and effective.
The legislators tried to balance the need for affordable drugs with the need for quality and safety of those drugs, and their policy decisions which now serve as insurmountable legal obstacles to the importation of virtually any drugs from Canada. Nevada’s Canadian drug program had been put on hold while the attorney general studied the new law that states a Canadian pharmacy shall not sell to a Nevada resident a drug that hasn’t been approved by the federal Food and Drug Administration.
