By James Giannecchini on 18 November 2012 Those who the Pharmacy Magazine
Gianfranco Simoncini, councilor for productive activities of the Tuscany region, which already several weeks ago openly sided with Farmindustria in the dispute with the government over the obligation to prescription with active ingredient (alignment shared somewhat by the whole Region Tuscany), returns to talk about it after the new amendments: “A point of balance between the savings needs of the health system and the protection ofpharmaceutical industry national must be found. The amendments to the development decree presented yesterday in the Senate committee by the UDC, Lega, Pdl and Pd to the rules on the prescriptions of generics go in this direction and I therefore hope that they will be approved. What is emerging in Parliament is the right path for a solution in the interest of the entire country-system: it must be undertaken with conviction”. The commissioner and the entire Tuscan council have long supported the reasons for the pharmaceutical industry, also in consideration of the fact that the investments that this type of industry has made in their territory are truly huge. Any regulation that goes against the interests of the pharmaceutical industry affects the Region of Tuscany directly. Many analysts were rather surprised by the pharmaceutical industry's policy, which apart from a few meetings with the government, some strong declarations, some striking but not very convincing protests, had so far not shown even a part of the strength that one would expect from a power similar economy. The move has arrived, the strategy has been discovered: while a few straw fires were burning, with blackmail, threats, protests... under cover, attempts were made to reach the Industry Commission, the Senate, the Chamber, within the Government itself. The result? 4 amendments, very similar, presented by the Udc, Lega, Pd and Pdl to the rule that required the prescription by means of an active ingredient. The amendments, which will be voted on in the Commission next week, effectively transform that obligation, considered unjust, into an option. That is, it renders the rule useless. In Parliament there are no specific rules to establish what is optional to write in recipes; usually at this stage, the legislator establishes what is mandatory. The fundamental purpose of the law was to launch generics once and for all, looking at the savings of the State and the citizen, and on the other hand condemning the
