House Bill 4044 - Repeal a 1995 law granting legal immunity to drug companies. Passed by then-Governor John Engler and the Republican-controlled Legislature, the law gives companies absolute immunity from legal action so long as the drug in question has been approved for safety and efficacy by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

House Bill 4045 - Make the repeal retroactive so that Michigan residents harmed by dangerous drugs since 1996 can seek legal recourse.

House Bill 4046 - Include all drug companies in the Consumer Protection Act, from which they are currently exempted.

Drug Industry Immunity Must End (DIIME), is a victims' rights coalition that has been fighting for a repeal of drug industry immunity for over 18 months. Michigan Citizen Action, a non-profit and non-partisan organization with over 50,000 members statewide, serves as the convener of the DIIME coalition.

DIIME represents democracy in action. DIIME members are citizens of Michigan whose lives have been forever impacted because they or a loved one took a prescription drug they were told was safe. We are not paid lobbyists, we are not representing a special interest, rather we are standing together with a common goal - we are determined to make Michigan law work for the people, not the drug industry. We have visited Legislators, testified at hearings, and traveled around the state to hold town hall meetings, begging lawmakers to repeal Michigan's unfair and unjust law.

In the wake of scandals surrounding drugs such as Vioxx, Rezulin and Bextra, there have been revelations that many members of FDA approval boards have ties to the pharmaceutical industry. Michigan residents cannot blindly trust the FDA and must be able to hold the drug companies accountable when dangerous drugs make it to the market. The public testimony of FDA scientists such as Dr. David Graham indicated that the FDA's system for drug evaluation is "broken."

Michigan's unique and deadly law gives powerful drug companies absolute drug industry immunity. No matter how dangerous the drug, how many are killed, how grossly negligent the drug maker is, no matter how much they knew beforehand--there is no accountability. The average citizen cannot hold a drug company accountable if a product harms or kills someone.

In 2005, 187 Michigan residents filed claims against Warner-Lambert, maker of the diabetes drug Rezulin. These claims were dismissed by a New York federal court judge because of the Michigan law. Rezulin was pulled off the market in 2000 after it was linked to nearly 400 deaths and thousands of cases of liver failure.

Vioxx, an anti-inflammatory drug that its maker, Merck, pulled off the market in 2004, may have caused heart attacks or cardiac deaths in up to 139,000 Americans, based on Merck's own studies. Bextra was taken off the market in 2005 due to an increased risk of heart attack and serious skin reactions among the painkiller's users.

Michigan's drug industry immunity law was a mistake when it was enacted. We need to fix the mistake because Michigan is a much better place, we are a much better people that to have such an unfair and intolerable law on our books.