MONROE – In a move to increase consumer protection in Michigan and hold drug companies accountable, State Representative Kate Ebli (D-Monroe) today introduced a plan that requires drug companies to fully disclose how they spend their marketing money and bans lavish gifts such as extravagant trips and meals to doctors.
"This plan helps our state ensure that the wealthy drug industry is not allowed to put profits before people and secrecy ahead of safety," said Ebli, who is sponsoring one of the bills in this package. "Consumers are the winners in this fight to increase transparency and openness within the drug industry."
The plan would:
- Require companies to report all drug advertising and marketing expenditures, including gifts to doctors and other health care workers.
- Require companies to report research and development expenditures.
- Ban lavish drug company gifts to doctors and limit gifts to $100 worth a year.
- Establish a searchable Web site that details drug companies' marketing expenses and gifts to doctors, which would be maintained by the Department of Community Health.
Wealthy drug companies spend more than $21 billion annually on marketing.[1] Merck, maker of the now-banned painkiller Vioxx, spent more than $160 million on an aggressive advertising campaign in 2000; as a result, sales of Vioxx quadrupled to $1.5 billion.[2] Vioxx may have caused heart attacks or cardiac deaths in up to 139,000 Americans, based on Merck's own studies, before it was pulled from shelves in 2004.[3]
"Across the country, there has been an increased focus on how increasing accountability within the drug industry can strengthen consumer protections and save lives," Ebli said. "This plan is the right thing to do to safeguard the health and well-being of all Michigan residents."