Monitoring and preventing drug shortages a job that is overseen by the FDA. The FDA has no authority to require companies to make drugs. Instead it works with industry, healthcare professionals and patients to prevent and lessen the severity of drug shortages. The FDA works with companies who manufacture drugs that are in shortage to communicate and work to make the drug more available. Manufactures are not required to report expected shortages, or how long the shortages are expected to last. This reporting is done on just a voluntary basis, though the FDA strongly encourages the drug manufactures to make this information known.
Drug shortages are an increasing problem in the United States. Many of the drugs that do become scarce are older generic drugs that are less profitable. In other cases, something goes wrong during the manufacturing of the medication, and the process has to be stopped. When just one or two companies are manufacturing a drug, and they have to stop making it, there is a deficit and the supply dips below the demand, resulting in a shortage. The FDA works with other manufactures that make the same drug to increase the production so they can help to compensate for this loss. It works to prevent shortage and to reduce the impact of a shortage. However, this is not always enough to compensate for this loss.
U.S. Drug Shortages From 2001 To 2010
(http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2011/10/04/140958404/shortages-lead-doctors-to-ration-critical-drugs)
The effects of a drug shortage can be devastating. Drug shortages are causing doctors and drug manufactures to ration medications. Some of the medications that have been in shortage include: chemotherapy agents, anesthetics, antibiotics, electrolytes needed for nutrient solutions, blood pressure medication and much more. It can lead to death in some cases. Some patients have to go without the medication as doctors reserve to use it for the most critical patients. This can lead to doctors using different drugs, or combining other drugs, but this can lead to errors and a change in the therapeutic effect of the drug when alternative medications are used. There is no perfect alternative to the prescribed drug.
There are a couple steps that can happen right off the bat to combat and lessen this emerging crisis. First, the FDA can have a tighter regulation on the reporting by manufactures of drug shortages and the extent of predicted deficits. Also, if multiple companies were to make the same drug, if something happened during the manufacturing process of one drug, the other companies would be able to pick up the slack and lessen the effect of the shortage on the market.
http://www.fda.gov/Drugs/DrugSafety/DrugShortages/default.htm
http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2011/10/04/140958404/shortages-lead-doctors-to-ration-critical-drugs
