Medicines Australia sets up new taskforce on transparency for payments to doctors

Medicines Australia has invited the Australian Medical Association, the Royal Australian College of Physicians, the Consumers Health Forum and other key health care and consumer organizations to join a newly established Transparency Working Group.

The move follows last month’s announcement of a new Code of Conduct for the nation’s pharmaceutical industry, which requires Medicine Australia member companies for the first time to provide public disclosure of aggregate payments to doctors and consumer groups (The Pharma Letter July 6), but which still came under criticism that the new reporting requirements were of little value as they fell short of naming individual doctors and the payments provided to them by drug companies for particular purposes.

The Transparency Working Group, to be chaired by Medicines Australia board member Dominic Barnes, will develop new measures to increase transparency of pharmaceutical company payments to health care professionals. Medicines Australia chief executive Brendan Shaw said the group would be asked to recommend what further transparency measures should be introduced that would best serve the community.