ADDICTIONS ON THE NET

Congress and state governments are debating the "reimportation" of
prescription medications from Canada and elsewhere. American pharmaceutical
companies don't like the idea, but Americans are justified in feeling
ripped off when prescription drugs cost two or three times as much in this
country as they cost in Canada and Europe.

But while reimportation is an idea whose time may have come, that
discussion should not be confused with a growing trade in prescription
narcotics on the Internet.

If junk e-mails are the bane of computer users, the flood of ads for
painkillers, mood-altering drugs and prescription medicines, such as
hydrocodone, Xanax and Valium, is spam's deadly underbelly.

Ordering drugs over the Internet -- often from anonymous Web merchants - -
offers no guarantee of purity, or even that the drugs ordered will be
received. In fact, consumers who trust shadowy Internet entrepreneurs to
fill their drug orders may be flirting with harm if the merchandise is
contaminated or mislabeled.

The term "prescription drug" implies that a doctor has examined a patient
and determined that a certain remedy in a certain dosage taken a certain
number of times is medically sound. But many Web pharmaceuticals are hiring
doctors who write prescriptions based on what "patients" report their
symptoms and maladies to be in e-mails. That's great merchandizing but bad
medicine.

As FDA Commissioner Mark B. McClellan said recently, "no one should argue
that uncontrolled access to controlled substances is a good idea."

Government reports indicate that painkiller abuse has tripled in the last
decade. "We think the nature of drug abuse in this country is evolving and
is moving toward prescription narcotics," FDA chief enforcement officer
John Taylor told The New York Times.

By all means, let's talk about reimportation. But the growing Internet
trade in controlled substances is, by and large, illegal and dangerous for
consumers. Recently, the FDA and the Drug Enforcement Agency announced a
crackdown on illegal Internet drug sales. That crackdown may include
prosecuting buyers as well as sellers of illegal prescription drugs. It's a
harsh remedy, but allowing the Internet to become the world's largest
uncontrolled drug market is fraught with dangers of its own.