An amendment may soon be offered on the Senate Floor ...
...that would limit available treatment options from compounded medications for dogs, cats and horses. The amendment is expected to be offered to S.959, legislation that is supposed to address the tragic situation where a rouge pharmacy acted like a manufacturer and violated numerous laws, resulting in the death of many people and making even more gravely ill. But the Animal Health Institute (AHI), an organization created and funding by the big drug companies, is apparently trying to use this tragedy to eliminate competition and treatment options at the expense of our beloved pets.
The amendment that will soon be offered targets the availability of customized medications that a veterinarian believes is in the best interest of family pets and horses. These important treatment options entail making specialized drugs fromactive pharmaceutical ingredients in a precise dosage amount, or in a form that a veterinarian believes would increase compliance and the ease of administration. For example, a bitter tablet might be altered to a flavored powder that can be sprinkled on food, or a pill a pet refuses to swallow might be converted to a cream that can be rubbed onto the animal’s skin). Your pet gets the treatment it needs and deserves, but the drug companies do not get the profits they seem to think they are entitled to get.
The amendment was temporarily pulled from S.959 when it was approved on May 22, 2013 by the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions. But as a lobbyist for AHI was recently quoted in a trade journal, ““We hope our absence from the bill is temporary.”