During the past three years of GLP-1 drug frenzy, there’s been a quiet but consequential distortion in how medication access and safety are talked about in media and elsewhere.
Compounding pharmacies like yours, which have long filled critical gaps in patient care, are being painted continually with the same brush as counterfeiters and black-market operators. The public narrative — fueled by drugmaker spin, misleading headlines, and even vague FDA statements — threatens not just your profession but the patients who rely on the customized medications you prepare.
Through it all, APC continues to speak for small-business, state-licensed pharmacies and outsourcing facilities that don’t have PR teams or investor calls, and the patients they serve when big pharma falls short—whether that’s during a drug shortage or in cases where commercial products simply don’t meet individual needs.
Where drugmakers and the sock-puppet organizations that mouth their messaging distort and conflate, we tell the truth. Where media misunderstands, we correct and clarify. And where FDA piles on with warnings not investigated or rooted in fact, we protest and push back.
Lately I’ve been thinking about Rodney Dangerfield, the late comic who was misunderstood even as he played to packed rooms: No respect. Compounders are like that: Smart professionals who are regulated, responsive, and essential to the healthcare system, yet who continue to be misunderstood and undervalued.
In this time when misinformation spreads faster than facts — and when regulatory clarity matters more than ever — APC will continue to separate hype from harm, and knockoffs from nuance.
Because for the patients you serve, it’s no joking matter.
—Scott
Scott Brunner, CAE, is is APC’s respectable (?) CEO. You can reach him at scott@a4pc.org.