Antinuclear

Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) unfair monopoly on selling radiopharmaceuticals

 He alleges the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation used “duplicitious” and “uncompetitive” tactics to push Cyclopet out of the NSW marketplace.

a report by the Productivity Commission’s Australian Government Competitive Neutrality Complaints Office that backs his allegations, 

PET peeve provokes a stoush BY: LEIGH DAYTON  The Australian July 28, 2012   Cyclopharm’s James McBrayer believes Cyclopet could have flourished in a fair playing field.  JAMES McBrayer is not a happy man. Since 2006, the company he heads has spent nearly $10 million on establishing a business producing and supplying a radiopharmaceutical used in positron emission tomography, or PET scans.

While the market for Cyclopet’s product, fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG), is
strong and growing, the little firm is not and McBrayer, chief
executive of Cyclopet’s parent company Cyclopharm, blames Australia’s
nuclear research facility. He alleges the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation used “duplicitious” and “uncompetitive” tactics to push Cyclopet out of the NSW marketplace.
“We want an end to the unfair playing field,” says McBrayer, adding
that honest competition would have enabled Cyclopet to be in profit in
its second year. “Instead, we lost $2m last year.”

Armed with a report by the Productivity Commission’s Australian
Government Competitive Neutrality Complaints Office that backs his
allegations, McBrayer has lodged a complaint with the Australian
Competition and Consumer Commission and faces
The stoush is causing concern in the NSW nuclear medicine community,
the nation’s biggest user of radiopharmaceuticals. “What we want is a
competitive and fair supply of radiopharmaceuticals that’s not
restricted,” says Barry Elison, a nuclear medicine physician at the
University of Wollongong and co-chair of the NSW Nuclear Medicine
Network.

That’s not the case at present, he says, as Petnet holds the exclusive
contract for supplying Another clinician, who did not wish to be
named, adds: “We need local suppliers, and more than one.” He worries
that suppliers like Cyclopet, which are accredited by the Therapeutic
Goods Administration to be good manufacturing practice (GMP) compliant
– guaranteeing a safe and reliable product – will fold or not enter
the market, leaving clinicians at the mercy of supply-chain failures.

Sydney’s Royal Prince Alfred Hospital established a cyclotron facility
in 2005 because of the unreliability of ANSTO’s National Medical
Cyclotron. ANSTO abandoned FDG production that year and the cyclotron
was decommissioned in 2010. The hospital produces and sells FDG to
John Hunter, Liverpool and St Vincent’s hospitals without being
licensed as GMP compliant.

“The arrangement is just madness,” says the clinician. “We need a
proper state supply strategy based on either solid public funding or a
proper commercial basis.”

For Elison and his colleagues the underlying problem is the way NSW
Health procures all radiopharmaceuticals, not just FDG. For instance,
non-PET radiopharmaceuticals such as those based on technetium-99m are
used in imaging and functional studies of the brain, heart, liver and
other organs, as well as the skeleton, blood and, critically, cancers.
While private clinics and hospitals may source radiopharmaceuticals
from any supplier, those in the public system must purchase them from
NSW Health-approved suppliers. Local health districts are required to
manage purchases themselves. In August 2009, the government department
sourcing accredited suppliers changed, allowing existing contracts to
continue. At that time, FDG was not on the list.

“With the increasing number of PET cameras (scanners) being
established, it was considered appropriate to put in place a
(separate) contract for FDG that provided potential for volume
discounts,” a health ministry spokesman explains.

In May last year the lucrative contract was awarded to Petnet,
triggering complaints from McBrayer, who is pushing Health Minister
Jillian Skinner to have the tender revoked and put out again, as
Petnet’s bid was found to have violated competitive neutrality
policy.The minister and NSW Health director-general Mary Foley refuse
to do so, citing a two-line statement about pricing in the AGCNCO
report. The health ministry spokesman says: “Legal advice is,
therefore, that there are no grounds to rescind.” The minister is on
leave.

Hence McBrayer’s decision to take ANSTO to court and to complain to
the ACCC…….
Cyclopharm listed on the Australian Stock Exchange in January 2007.
Soon after, ANSTO made a market announcement with technology firm
Siemens Australia and New Zealand.

“We now believe the ANSTO board endorsed management’s proposal
inspired by, and with full knowledge of, Cyclopharm’s plans,” McBrayer
says. “No wonder we’re claiming damages under the Trade Practices Act,
alleging misleading and deceptive conduct and misuse of market power.”
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/health-science/pet-peeve-provokes-a-stoush/story-e6frg8y6-1226436117551

July 27, 2012 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | AUSTRALIA - NATIONAL, secrets and lies