Sen. Schumer visits Roswell Park, laying out 3-point plan to address drug shortages

Bills seek to prevent shortages of chemotherapy and other drugs, address price-gouging

U.S. Senator Charles Schumer visited Roswell Park January 5, 2012, to draw attention to the impact of national shortages of many life-saving medications, including chemotherapy drugs and other drugs essential to cancer care. The senator held a press conference at Roswell Park featuring comments from Roswell Park President and CEO Donald L. Trump, MD, FACP, at which he detailed his three-point plan to address the shortages, which have affected patients nationwide.

“Studies have been interrupted or stopped because the drug is not available,” Dr. Trump said at the press conference. “This is a trial using a commercially available drug that is in very short supply, we had to suspend that trial or not be able to offer it to patients.”

Sen. Schumer, D-NY, is co-sponsor of a U.S. Senate bill that would create an FDA early-warning system designed to prevent drug shortages, make drug price gouging a federal crime and demand an FTC investigation into medical “gray market” that has sent drug costs skyrocketing.

For more information, click here to go to a press release from Sen. Schumer's office, or here for a Buffalo Business First article about the announcement.