Nelson: Federal agents to stop medicine seizures

Media release

October 3, 2006

WASHINGTON, D.C. – An elderly Florida couple’s complaint to their U.S. senator about the government seizing their prescription drugs ordered from Canada has resulted in a major policy reversal by the Bush administration.

Lee and Jean Edes, of Mount Dora, had long ordered their personal medications from Canada, where they saved about 40 percent on their prescription drug bills. But when their prescriptions started vanishing in the mail - like tens of thousands of Americans whose drugs have been seized by federal agents in a clandestine crackdown - they complained to Sen. Bill Nelson, who charged that the administration seemed bent on forcing seniors into the president’s new prescription drug program.

Now, faced with a looming congressional probe spurred by Nelson, the Department of Homeland Security late yesterday agreed to stop confiscating prescription drugs mailed to American consumers from Canadian pharmacies.

“This is a huge victory,” Nelson said today in Orlando, where he’s been working during the current congressional recess. “For nearly a year, the White House has been punishing seniors for filling their prescriptions at lower Canadian prices. Now it looks like the government is getting out of the business of harassing these consumers.”

Word that the administration is ending U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s role in the controversial drug-seizure program came in an e-mail from a Homeland Security official to congressional staff late Monday. Since last November, some 40,000 Americans have had their prescriptions seized by Customs’ agents.

Most drug re-importation is illegal under current U.S. law. But the government had turned a blind eye to personal orders coming in the mail across the Canadian border. Last Nov. 17, however, the administration abruptly changed its policy and Customs, under the auspices of Homeland Security, began systematically seizing small packages from Canadian drugstores.

The stepped-up seizure program became publicly known only after Nelson, acting on complaints from the Edes and about 100 others, openly challenged the government’s tactics as a White House ploy to drive seniors into its new Medicare prescription drug plan. Nelson’s office had discovered that federal agents began seizing drugs just two days after enrollment started for the Bush administration’s Medicare Part D program.

In February, Nelson called for the Homeland Security agency’s inspector general to investigate why federal agents were intercepting pharmaceuticals shipped from Canada. The agency turned down Nelson’s request for a probe. He then filed legislation with Sen. David Vitter, a Republican from Louisiana, to allow consumers to fill their prescriptions at Canadian pharmacies and receive them in the mail. The bipartisan legislation passed the Senate in July by a 68-32 vote. But Republican lawmakers substantially weakened the measure last month in closed-door meetings with the House. The final version will only allow consumers to buy and personally carry home Canadian-filled prescriptions.

Meantime, Nelson began pushing last summer for a congressional probe into the drug seizures. In a letter to Sen. Sue Collins, a Republican from Maine and chair of the Senate’s homeland security panel, Nelson sought an investigation into reasons for the drug confiscations. Collins sent Nelson’s request to a subcommittee run by Sen. Norm Coleman, a Republican from Minnesota, a state where consumers routinely cross the border in buses to fill prescriptions at costs much lower than U.S. prices.

Only yesterday - after nearly a year of probing and prodding led in large part by Nelson - Customs said in an e-mail to congressional staff it was halting its involvement in the seizure of Canadian drugs. The decision means the Food and Drug Administration resumes the job of overseeing drug imports from Canada, as it did prior to last November. The FDA generally allowed consumers to receive a small supply of medicine for personal use.

Nelson said today he still wants the congressional probe by Sen. Collin’s committee to seek answers on why the administration started the medicine seizures in the first place.

A copy of yesterday’s e-mail from Homeland Security is available at: http://billnelson.senate.gov/supporting/DHSemail.pdf

A recent AP article on lawmakers weakening a measure to let consumers import Canadian drugs is available at: http://www.billnelson.senate.gov/news/details.cfm?id=264320&

Nelson’s previous letter to Sen. Collins seeking an investigation of the government’s program to confiscate consumers’ medicines is available at: http://billnelson.senate.gov/supporting/pdrugseizureltr.pdf

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