17 March 2017 - The four most recent FDA commissioners are warning Congress that legalising the importation of drugs from other countries — an idea that has drawn support from both Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump — is a risky approach that would endanger consumers by exposing them to fake, substandard and contaminated drugs.

The open letter to members of Congress, which was posted Friday by the Margolis Center for Health Policy at Duke University, was signed by two former FDA heads who served during the Obama administration — Robert Califf and Margaret Hamburg — and two who served under former president George W. Bush — Andrew von Eschenbach and Mark McClellan.

While acknowledging that drug importation is designed to give Americans access to less-expensive medicines, it also would likely “harm patients and consumers and compromise the carefully constructed system that guards the safety of our nation's medical products,” they write.

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