Generic drugs - Standing up for patients

HEALTH Minister Mary Harney is to be congratulated on her promise to introduce legislation to force pharmacists to tell their customers that generic drugs – usually far cheaper than branded drugs – are available and suitable for their needs.

At the moment a pharmacist can only supply the specific brand prescribed by their customer’s doctor even if cheaper alternatives are available. These arrangements may suit the pharmacists’ margins, but it is hard to understand why, all things being equal, a doctor would impose unnecessary cost on their patients by ordering any option other than the one that represents the best value. Why would they prescribe anything else?

Health insurance and medical costs have increased at a pace far greater than inflation over recent years and we should do all we can to control them.

Let’s hope that Mary Harney delivers on her promise, but it tells us something about ourselves that something as ordinary, something as basic and honest as this, must be given the force of legislation.