Senators Kohl and Durbin introduced an amendment to the Senate health reform bill that would ban pharmaceutical data mining for marketing. (For a refresher, see this blog explaining data mining)
As reported in the Associated Press, the sponsors of the amendment say that the measure will combat “harassing sales practices” and “restrain undue influence” of pharmaceutical salespersons.
We agree. The Massachusetts Prescription Reform Coalition supports a similar bill in the MA legislature (S. 17/H. 109) that would ban prescription data mining in Massachusetts. The MA law could be implemented much sooner- provided needed cost savings to all MA residents. Massachusetts should again lead the federal government by implementing a ban on data mining.
-Georgia Maheras
