Political Quotes

“I don't want things to be misrepresented. I want everybody to have a full understanding. The challenges in the HELP Committee do reflect the difficulty. When you are talking about safety, not just of cheaper drugs, if you give somebody a counterfeit drug that doesn't thin their blood and they have a stroke and they die, we have done a disservice. I don't want that to happen. I am not saying reimportation will cause that to happen, but I will say it is our responsibility to put safety No. 1. I promise you, I will do that. It is an important issue. We agreed on March 11 to put a process in place. Three attempts by the HELP Committee were mentioned that were canceled or postponed. Let me just say, on Thursday July 22, the Subcommittee on Investigations of the Senate Committee on Governmental Affairs held a second hearing on purchasing prescription drugs. On July 21, the HELP Committee had planned to do the markup. It had to be postponed. That is correct. On July 14, the Senate Judiciary Committee held a hearing on the implications--that is, safety. They also talked about intellectual property trade. But they specifically focused on the drug importation legislation. On June 23, the Senate GOP HELP Committee had a briefing to help educate us broadly. It was not a markup but a briefing to educate us broadly to discuss, specifically, importation.”