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u-Bob · 10-30-2010, 10:52 AM

http://boingboing.net/2010/10/01/pha...affiliate.html

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Online prescription companies have made it possible for many of us to get drugs we could not otherwise afford from "offshore" sources. Now, one of the most prominent offshore suppliers is telling customers "After recent action taken by LegitScript.com we have had to stop supplying customers within the USA." Alex Blaze at Bilerico reports:

LegitScript also wears their partnership with the National Association of Boards of Pharmacy, which opposes drug reimportation from Canada, a cheaper alternative to American medications that was discussed during health care reform but was rejected mainly because it would save the average American $800 a year, which would come directly from the pharmaceutical industry (crazily enough, the NABP decries Canadian drugs as "unsafe," even though they help license pharmacies in nine provinces).

If this were about protecting people from shady online companies providing unsafe or counterfeit drugs, that would be one thing. But the blocked site, InHousePharmacy.com, has been providing great products and service for years. I know it's widely used by transgender people, who are far more likely to be priced out of insurance and privatized healthcare options. The alternative is dangerous black market hormones that used to be far too prevalent among low-income trans people. LegitScript feels like they're pulling a page from other protectionist trade organizations in the news, in order to maintain revenue streams for deep-pocket industries.

http://www.bilerico.com/2010/09/inho..._to_the_us.php

http://pharmacycheckerblog.com/legitscript-not-so-legit

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A firm called Legit Script (LegitScript.com) claims to be protecting people by labeling legitimate Canadian and other non-U.S. pharmacies as ?Unapproved? or ?Rogue.? This serves the big pharmaceutical interests but not the American consumer. More than that, its founder, John Horton, appears to have exploited his former government position to establish LegitScript.com for his own gain.

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In 2007, John Horton worked in the Bush White House as Deputy Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP). ...

Congress had called for a report from ONDCP to propose a ?strategy to stop advertisements that provide information about obtaining over the Internet drugs?without the use of a lawful prescription ...
Moreover, Congress? request was limited in scope to controlled substances. Horton, as the chief staff person on this assignment, apparently switched the focus of the report from preventing access to controlled medicines without prescriptions to denying Americans access to any type of medicine, even with a valid prescription, if coming from a Canadian pharmacy.

The absurdity of this switch is that reputable licensed Canadian pharmacies require prescriptions and won?t even sell controlled substances to Americans. We believe this switch was encouraged by big pharmaceutical interests, who make less money when drugs are purchased at lower cost outside the U.S. To achieve their purpose, the report took aim at search engines as well as PharmacyChecker.com. The ONDCP?s paper stated:

?Both Google and Yahoo use a third-party system called PharmacyChecker.com (located at www.PharmacyChecker.com) to verify whether websites seeking to advertise an online pharmacy are legitimate. However, PharmacyChecker has approved several websites from Canada that may be operating lawfully in Canada, but offer prescription drugs to United States consumers??
...
Approving safe, lawful Canadian pharmacies which require prescriptions certainly does not make PharmacyChecker.com ?inadequate? or ?unreliable.? Quite the contrary. Nevertheless, the paper lays out the plan that we believe Horton hatched, promoted and attempted to execute for the past three years:

?The DEA, Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and/or ONDCP will meet with the major Internet advertising services (Google, Yahoo and others) to encourage voluntary action such that only online pharmacies in compliance with Federal and State laws are advertised through the major Internet advertising services. Search engines will be requested to voluntarily adopt standards that comply and encourage consumer compliance with Federal and State laws and regulations, and Boards of Pharmacy standards. This will be done in consultation with the State Boards of Pharmacy through the NABP.?

As we see it, Horton was setting the stage for his company, LegitScript.com, to use this ?U.S. only? standard to displace PharmacyChecker.com as the leading certifier of online pharmacies and to pressure the search engines into blocking advertising of lower cost pharmacies in Canada and elsewhere. While Horton was a government employee, on March 20, 2007 his company?s domain name legitscript.com was registered