FDAnews Drug Daily Bulletin

Drug Shortages Not Entirely FDA’s Fault (DrugWonks blog)
“Despite what you might have read in a recent congressional report, drug shortages are neither the exclusive fault of the FDA, nor does the FDA represent the entire solution,” blogger Peter Pitts writes. What it comes down to, the blogger believes, is economics. Market price stability and patient safety are not within the FDA’s control. “Alleviating a shortage by shorting GMPs is a bad and dangerous pathway,” Pitts writes. “Expediency causes as many problems as it solves.”  A U.S. government analysis of average sales prices shows that oncology sterile injectables that experienced shortages since 2008 decreased in price from $56.17 per unit in Q1 2006 to $37.88 per unit in Q1 2011, Pitts added.