State Policy: List of State Bills Restricting Pharmaceutical and Device Marketing or Limiting Continuing Medical Education

 

Several state legislatures have filed bills affecting the pharmaceutical and device industry on addressing Continuing Medical Education (CME), and the list only promises to grow longer as states begin their legislative sessions.

Reviews of Several State Legislatures:

Colorado

House and Senate has introduced the “Prescription Drug Ethics Act,” which includes bans on all “gifts” payments and transfers of value.

Iowa

The State Assistant Majority Leader has introduced the Iowa Healthcare Coverage Partnership program, and it includes bans on payments and gifts, reporting, advertising and expenditure reporting, restricting data mining, and academic detailing.  They use the definition of CME as having more than one speaker.

The bill was assigned to the committee where the sponsor is the chairman. 

Illinois

Introduced the Prescription Drug Ethical Marketing Act and includes reporting of all payments, fees, and gifts. 

New York      

Governor Paterson’s budget includes a resolution to adopt a strict ban on “gifts” to

physicians.

Assemblymen have introduced a bill eliminating the tax exemption for direct-to

consumer advertising.  This will go over really well on Madison Avenue in New York

Texas            

Three disclosure bills, with one requiring disclosure of payments for all CME except those sponsored by a medical society.  Also, a bill has been filed that bans resale of prescription data.  Given the make-up of Texas, we give these bills a Rhode Island-sized chance of passing in this very large, conservative state.

Vermont

Their bill that includes a “gift ban” on anything of value and reporting on everything else.  With 30 of the 30 state senators as co-sponsors, this is a trouble spot.

Virginia

Data Mining Restriction.  This will go down in history as one of the quickest turn-arounds on a bill.  It was introduced on the 14^th of January, and killed in committee on February 3^rd.

Washington

Restrictions on the sale of patent identifiable data.  Actually, we do not have a problem with this except if it does not allow sale of data for marketing.

Therapeutic Substitution: allows for pharmacists to replace Medicaid prescriptions for branded drugs with non-branded generics.  As a patient, I have always been pleased to have my pharmacist or managed care company second guess my physician, they are out for me as long as I don’t cost them anything.

The four states to keep a close eye on are Colorado,Iowa,New York and Vermont.

Other states that have publicly stated they will strive for stronger restrictions but have not filed bills as of this report, include Minnesota (enhanced disclosure), West Virginia (enhanced disclosure) and Maine (adding device manufacturers to their reports).

Download Listing of State Bills 2009 2-12-09

See list of Bills and Relevant Links:

 

State	Introduced	Bill Number	Sponsor	Bill Title and Web Link	Description	Type	Status
Colorado	2/3/09	SB09-166	House: Morgan Carroll	Prescription Drug Ethics Act	Bans all gift, fee, payment, subsidy, or other economic benefit to a health care practitioner.	Payment and Gift Ban	Assigned to Business, Labor and Technology
			Senate: Sal Pace
					Requires Reporting of other payments	Payment Disclosure
Iowa	1/27/09	SF 48	Senate: Jack Hatch Assistant Majority Leader Senate	IOWA HEALTH CARE COVERAGE PARTNERSHIP PROGRAM	In addition to Healthcare Coverage it includes the kitchen sink of pharmaceutical	Payment and Gift Ban	Assigned to Committee Human Resources Sponsor is Committee Chairman
					marketing restrictions and defines CME as only multi speaker events
				Bill Book		Payment Reporting
						Advertising and Marketing Expenditures Reporting
						Restricting Data Mining
						Academic Detailing
Illinois	1/27/09	HB0332	Rep. Jack D. Franks and Fred Crespo	Prescription Drug Ethical Marketing Act	Requires  manufacturer labeler that sells prescription drugs to disclose the value, nature, and purpose of any gift, fee, payment, subsidy, or other economic benefit provided in connection with detailing or promotional or other marketing activities  to any health care working that can prescribe drugs	Payment Disclosure	Referred to Human Services Committee
							2/4/2009
Minnesota	Not yet filed		Senator John Marty	Policy Med	Greater Disclosure Measures	Payment Reporting
					Article
						Gift Ban
New York	1/7/09	A.158	Governor Paterson	State Budget Bill (Page 54-55)	Includes Governors Recommendation for Legislation on Payment Ban and Restriction on CME talks	Payment and Gift Ban	Referred to Ways and Means
		S. 58					1/7/2009
				Section C		Restriction on CME Presentations	Amended and re-referred to Ways and Means
				Gift and Payment Ban			1/21/2009
New York	2/10/09	A05030	Sponsor: Assemblyman Brodsky	Prohibits manufacturers and distributors of prescription drugs from deducting the costs of advertising such drugs to consumers from their income taxes		DTC Advertising Tax Exemption	Referred to Ways and Means
			Co Sponsors:				2/10/2009
			Cahill, Clark, Koon, Weisenberg
Texas	11/10/08"	SB 151	Sponsor State Senator Rodney Ellis	Physician Drug Marketing	Name and Address	Payment Disclosure	Referred to Health and Human Services 2/10/09
					$25.00 bottom
				Article	Excludes Samples
				Policy Med
Texas	1/13/09	SB 296	Sponsor State Senator Royce West	Disclosure of Payments and Transfer of Value		Payment Disclosure	Referred to Committee on State Affairs 2/11/2009
				Article
				Policy Med
Texas	1/27/09	SB 553	Sponsor Lucio	Relating to the disclosure of certain economic benefits provided by manufacturers or repackagers of prescription drugs; providing penalties	Limits gifts of $75.00 or more, CME is excluded only for specialty societies (Universities, hospitals and MECC’s will have to report participants)	Payment Disclosure	No Action
							2/11/2009
Texas	2/3/09	SB 646	Sponsor Vande Putte	Relating to a study regarding the confidentiality of prescription information; providing a civil penalty	Restricts Resale of Prescription Data	Data Mining	No Action 2/11/2009
							Bill Stages
Vermont	1/30/09	S 48	Sponsor Kevin Mullen	Health; prescription drugs; marketing; gift; ban; disclosure	Defines CME as offers CME credit, features multiple presenters on scientific research, or is authorized by the sponsoring association to recommend or make policy.	Gift Ban	Referred to Committee on Finance
			Cosponsors include all 30 of the state senators			Payment Disclosure
				Policy Med
Virginia	1/14/09	HB 2452	Delegate Mark Sicles	confidentiality of prescription information		Data Mining	Referred to Health Welfare and Institutions, 1/14/09
							Stricken from the Docket 2/03/09
Washington	1/21/09	HB 1493 – 2009-10	Sponsor: Rep Jamie Pederson	Marketing Prescription Drugs	Restrictions on selling patient data that includes patient name	Resale of Patient identifiable data – Covers all data	February 13th Hearing Committee on Health and Wellness
						News Story
	2/5/09	SB 5892 – 2009-10		Relating to authorizing state purchased health care programs		Therapeutic Substitution	Referred to committee on Health and Long Term Care
				to maximize appropriate prescription drug use in a cost-effective
				manner