Association Strongly Urges Governor to Avoid Proposal That Violates Federal and State Laws

The National Association of Boards of Pharmacy® (NABP®) responded to Governor Rod R. Blagojevich's September 15, 2003 proposal directing the Illinois special advocate to draft a plan for buying inexpensive medications in Canada for as many as 240,000 state employees and retirees with a request for a meeting with the governor to present its concerns about the illegal importation of medications from Canada.

In a letter to Governor Blagojevich, NABP Executive Director Carmen A. Catizone indicated support for studying the issue, but also outlined the Association's concerns with adopting a plan to illegally purchase medications from Canada. Catizone noted that directing the State of Illinois to implement a plan to purchase medications from Canada would violate both federal and Illinois law, circumvent the United States health care regulatory system — in particular, Illinois' pharmacy regulatory framework — and compromise the medication distribution system in Illinois and across the country. NABP has repeatedly acknowledged, throughout the debate of allowing for the purchase of medications from Canadian entities, that access to affordable medications is an important issue for patients in the US but cannot be resolved by compromising patient health and safety through the illegal importation of medications from Canada.

"If the governor proceeds with the plan to purchase medications from Canada, he will be in violation of both federal and state laws," said Catizone. "Access to medications is certainly an important issue to US citizens and Illinois citizens, but endangering the citizens of Illinois is a serious concern that we have." NABP was founded in 1904 and represents all of the pharmacy regulatory and licensing jurisdictions in the United States, Puerto Rico, Guam, the Virgin Islands, eight provinces of Canada, three Australian States, New Zealand, and South Africa.