Reply #2: Here is the standard "say one thing publicly, do another behind the

[Pirate Smile]

scenes".

"The Bush administration has strongly advocated generics as a way to hold down health care costs, and the director of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Mark B. McClellan, said in an interview this week that an ever-growing number of generics is essential to controlling the cost to the government and seniors of the new Medicare prescription drug program.

In a recent federal report on health care costs, one of the few bright spots was a slowdown in the rate of prescription drug spending that was credited largely to the growing use of generics, which now account for more than half of all prescriptions.

"This huge backlog of generic applications is just unacceptable," said Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-Calif.), one of the sponsors of the law that made generics more easily available two decades ago. "This is the time for the FDA to be ramping up its generic reviews, not to be falling so badly behind."

Last year, the generics office approved more than 450 applications, 23 fewer than the year before. The office took an average of 20.5 months to review each application, compared with 19.9 months in 1999, although by statute the agency is obliged to do the job within six months."