From fiscal year 2000 to fiscal year 2006, the Pentagon's prescription drug spending more than tripled from $1.6 billion to $6.2 billion, according to an April, 2008 Government Accountability Office report.
The head of the DOD's pharmaceutical program, Rear Admiral Thomas McGinnis, banned his own staff from going on company-paid trips, but other military pharmacy staff took about 400 trips, the Center points out.
Drug spending hit $6.8 billion in 2008, said McGinnis, and "the GAO expects DOD pharmaceutical spending to reach $15 billion by 2015," according to the summary.
In a May 19, 2009, report for MSNBC titled, "U.S. military: Heavily armed and medicated, Melody Petersen pointed out that military physicians "can be swayed by the aggressive promotional efforts of the pharmaceutical industry just like civilian doctors often are."
Military rules limit the handouts doctors can take from drug companies, she says. "A doctor can go to a dinner paid for by a drug company, but the meal's value can't be more than $20, and the value of all gifts received from a company over the course of a year can't exceed $50. "
However, drug companies find ways to work around the limits. For instance, Petersen reports that when "thousands of military and federal health-care professionals met in November (2008) for the annual meeting of the Association of Military Surgeons of the United States (AMSUS), more than 80 pharmaceutical companies and other health-care firms were on hand."
"The companies helped pay for that San Antonio event in exchange for the opportunity to set up booths in the convention hall, where sales reps pressed doctors to prescribe their products or to use their medical equipment and devices," she notes.
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