Auditor General report Feds not issuing timely warnings on drug risks

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This article was published 23/11/2011 (5309 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

OTTAWA — The public is waiting far too long to be warned about significant risks in the drugs they take, the federal auditor general said Tuesday.

It’s only the latest example of risk caused by rampant information mismanagement that is undercutting work in many federal departments, said interim auditor general John Wiersema.

He called on the government to ensure things don’t get worse as it goes about a major cost-cutting exercise over the coming years.

“We have found that poor information is a widespread, chronic problem in the federal government,” Wiersema said in an overview of government operations.

“Managers are not systematically collecting and using the information they need to manage their programs, and they are not held accountable for this.”

The audit of Health Canada found the department has an archaic system for monitoring that can take years to tell the public that some drugs already on the market come with significant risks.

In one case, a drug being prescribed for epilepsy, migraines, psychiatric conditions or weight loss was found to be linked to birth defects.

But it took six months for the brand-name drug to include a warning, and almost two years for generic producers to be told they had to change their labels and warnings.

In another case, the United States was already warning in 2006 that the long-term benefits of low-dose ASA could be eroded by taking ibuprofen at the same time.

But in Canada, a review took more than three years, and orders to change labelling for the public are still not fully in place for several hundred products that are affected.

“Health Canada is slow to act on potential safety issues related to drugs already on the market,” Wiersema said in a release.

“It needs to get safety information out to Canadians more quickly, and address the potential for conflict of interest.”

The fall report also highlighted problems in other departments:

— The government has failed to properly monitor how effectively funds were spent under the recession-fighting Economic Action Plan, including information about just how many jobs were created. The heavily promoted plan was a two-year, $47-billion stimulus spending exercise launched in January 2009 in the midst of a global recession.

— Canada’s visa officers are failing to screen applicants for dozens of diseases, concentrating instead on just two diseases that were prevalent 50 years ago.

— The military is doing a poor job of predicting its maintenance needs and costs over the long haul.

— A $284-million project to ease farmers out of tobacco production was so poorly monitored that some producers made business arrangements that undermined the program.

— The Canadian Press