Shine spotlight on this cozy relationship

For too long cozy arrangements between doctors and pharmaceutical companies in Canada have been the health industry’s dirty little secret. It’s a kind of relationship critics say enriches doctors and drug companies at a potential cost to patient health.

Now a new national campaign aims to shine a spotlight on these ties by asking the federal government to mandate public disclosure of all payments and transfers of value from drug makers to doctors.

The Open Pharma campaign, spearheaded by Toronto doctor Andrew Boozary, is most welcome and long overdue. In fact, it’s something the Canadian Medical Association called for five years ago.

If the plan is adopted by Health Minister Jane Philpott, as it should be, pharmaceutical companies would have to divulge money or gifts they give to individual doctors and organizations – including hospitals, universities and private medical clinics.

The disclosure list could include everything from funding for research, to fees for speeches, to payments for membership on advisory committees, to travel expenses, to international functions, to meals at boozy “educational” dinners, to gifts such as tickets to sporting events.

As the Toronto Star reports, Canada has been a laggard on this important issue behind countries such as the United States, Australia, Japan, the United Kingdom, France, Denmark and many other European nations that long ago set up transparency laws to illuminate the relationship between drug companies and doctors.

In those countries, the relationships exposed have often been highly alarming. A U.S. database, for instance, revealed that individual doctors in that country receive hundreds of thousands of dollars from drug companies in gifts and consulting fees.

Despite the lack of transparency here, we know Canada is not immune. A Star investigation found drug companies routinely host and bankroll dinners at upscale restaurants as training for family doctors. Critics of the dinners say they are just marketing tools under the guise of education.

And there have been numerous other controversies in Canada over perceived conflicts of interest because of pharmaceutical-company payouts, including alleged altering of studies.

The most recent controversy arose just three weeks ago, when Philpott ordered an independent review of Canada’s brand new prescriptive guidelines for opioids to make sure they weren’t “tainted by the influence of the industry.” Her order came after revelations that a doctor, who was part of a committee of medical experts who voted on whether to accept the guidelines, had received compensation from companies that make and market opioids.

The epidemic of opioid overdoses is a public health crisis. The appearance that our national response might have been compromised in some way by the financial ties between a doctor and pharmaceutical companies speaks to the urgent need for a better system.

Boozary says the Open Pharma campaign does not aim to ban industry involvement in the medical profession, but simply to make it transparent to inspire public confidence in the system. That’s a start – one the health minister should waste no time in embracing.