The Ongoing Battle

This year’s memories of the annual con-vention of the American Association ofEquine Practitioners (AAEP) include

beautiful weather, a great scientific program,and a bigger-than-ever trade show. On a per-sonal note, my memories also include 5 daysat Disney World with five grandkids and theirparents.

One thing that was not new at AAEPwas the ongoing discussion regarding com-pounders and ethical pharmaceutical compa-nies. Having conducted research under goodlaboratory practice standards for numerouscompanies, and having helped register twopharmaceutical products through the Foodand Drug Administration (FDA), I am cer-tainly aware of the time, money, and agonythat go into getting a product registeredthrough the FDA. It is no wonder that fewdrugs are currently being registered. Spend-ing $5 million to $10 million and taking nu-merous years to get a drug registered seemsto be the norm. Why is it that registration ofdrugs can be done for a fraction of this costin Australia and New Zealand? Pharmaceuti-cal companies also seem to have very little pro-tection from the compounders developingcompetitive products. One obvious solutionis for the AAEP and the pharmaceutical com-panies to continue to hammer on the com-pounders to stay in line. Another solutionwould be to lobby for the FDA to becomemore reasonable in their requirements fordrug registration, particularly if a drug isused in non�food-producing animals andparticularly because there are no slaughter-houses still in operation in the United States.It may be that, if the cost of registering drugswere lower, more companies, including com-pounding companies, would choose to go theFDA route. This may seem a very naı̈ve solu-tion, but I think it is one that should be inves-tigated.

Dr. Ed Squires

FROMTHE EDITOR

Edward L. Squires, PhD

72 Journal of Equine Veterinary Science � Vol 28, No 2 (2008)