DRUGS  (CONT)

With the Bush administration lending its foreign policy muscle, Australia could be the first beachhead in a new kind of "War on Drugs."

If Australia falls, it would ensure that other countries would need to follow suit in order to get a trade deal with the U.S. More worrying, it could provide impetus for a broader international agreement that undermines the policies that keep drugs affordable in most developed nations.

Canadians could live to regret that a number of our homegrown entrepreneurs have hastened to sell prescription drugs to U.S. customers. Although Congress flirted with the legalization of such imports earlier this summer, a flurry of lobbying by the drug industry beat back that plan.

Congress has now gone a step further and promised not to use Washington's formidable negotiating power on its one sacred constituency: The pharmaceutical industry.

Instead, that negotiating power will be deployed elsewhere, in a global effort to pressure other countries to let drug prices rise to the rafters.

Luke Eric Peterson is a Canadian writer and researcher on international affairs. He edits the website http://www.andinothernews.ca

Published on Friday, December 5, 2003 by the Toronto Star

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