Bernie Sanders Introduces Bill Imposing Jail Time for Pharma Execs

Vermont Senator and former Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders introduced a bill into the United States Senate on April 17, 2018, that would impose jail time on pharmaceutical executives whose companies engage in manipulative practices when marketing opioids. The bill, the Opioid Crisis Accountability Act of 2018, prohibits illegal marketing and distribution of opioids, creates a criminal liability for top company executives, penalizes drug manufacturers who illegally advertise, market, or distribute an opioid product, and requires drug makers to reimburse the United States for “the negative economic impact of their products,” an amount estimated to be north  of $78 million by the Centers for Disease Control. The legislation imposes a ten-year minimum prison sentence and fines equal to the executive’s compensation package if the company is found to have illegally contributed to the opioid crisis. There are a number of ways the Department of Health and Human Services could demonstrate such liability, including by mandating written justifications for prescription orders that seem medically unreasonable. The proposed bill reduces exclusivity in several ways, including: penalizing manufacturers who illegally advertise, market, or distribute an opioid product by stripping them of any remaining period of market exclusivity and reducing the remaining period of exclusivity by one half for all other opioid products made by the company. It also  preven...
Source: Policy and Medicine - Category: American Health Authors: Source Type: blogs