What’s Going On Here?

The igSherpa website highlights the unfair treatment of licensed, safe online pharmacies. It provides evidence that Big Pharma, the United States National Association of Boards of Pharmacy (NABP), and their collaborators are restricting consumer choice, competition, and safety to benefit themselves, at the expense of millions of patients who need affordable medicine to survive.

Some specific examples of unfair treatment:

• Big Pharma and NABP have lobbied governments to restrict the sale of medicine online.

• They have pressured credit card companies and banks to stop processing payments for online pharmacies.

• They have pressured search engines to block safe online pharmacies from advertising, while turning a blind eye to rogue actors pretending to be pharmacies.

• They have even tried to shut down websites that offer information about safe online pharmacies.

These are the types of actions that make it more difficult for patients to access affordable medicine. In too many cases, patients have been forced to go without medicine or to pay exorbitant prices for it.

The site also highlights positive efforts within the precincts of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (“igSherpa”), the  United Nations Internet Governance Forum (“IGF”), and RightsCon to establish principles, standards, and norms to ensure the safe procurement of medicine across national borders. Such efforts are important because they lead us toward ensuring that 21st century citizens with valid prescriptions, have access to safe, affordable medicine, regardless of where they live.