Prescription Drugs at Bargain Prices Across the Border : Health: The break comes because Mexico controls the prices. The quality of medication is said to be good.

Eleanor Hope used to come to Tijuana to buy silver jewelry, big pottery vases and leather purses. Now she focuses on antibiotics.

They’re the real bargain in Mexico, the Los Angeles-area nurse says. And, with two grown children who have no way to pay for prescription drugs if they get sick, Hope needs bargains.

“They’re so much cheaper here, it’s amazing,” she said, pointing to the tubes and bottles at a small brightly lit farmacia , or pharmacy, just blocks from the U.S. border.

“With the prices they charge in the U.S., a normal person can’t even afford to buy antibiotics,” Hope said.

Like a growing number of Americans--especially elderly people on fixed incomes--Hope, 48, has discovered cheap, legal medicines just across the Mexican border.

The reason is price controls--a hotly debated issue surrounding President Clinton’s health care reform plan.

Mexico mandates the price that companies--Mexican, European or U.S.--can charge for prescription drugs sold within its borders. The United States does not.

That’s why Dr. Cary Presant in Pasadena has directed some patients to Tijuana when they needed the drug Tamoxifin after breast cancer surgery. A generic version of the drug in Tijuana costs $23.70 for 30 tablets; in San Diego, a generic version costs $45.69 for the same amount.

Buyers seeking Naprosyn, an arthritis drug, can buy a generic form in Mexico for $7.73 for 45 pills; in San Diego, the U.S. generic form costs $29.39 for 45 pills.

Presant isn’t altogether happy about the situation. Patients can get a lot more from a U.S. pharmacist than just medication, said Presant, the head of the American Cancer Society in Los Angeles.

“The pharmacist can go over your drugs, make sure you have no adverse interactions, recommend when you may need to see your doctor, make sure there’s no possible side effects,” Presant said.

“The problem is, the drug companies charge a very high price on some of their products. When you’ve got someone who can’t afford that price but needs the drug, what are your choices?”

If a U.S. drug firm won’t provide the drug at a reduced price for an indigent patient, Presant recommends Tijuana. “It’s the same drug, often made by the same company, for a price that’s about two-thirds less,” he said.

In other cases, a patient has partial health coverage that doesn’t include prescription drugs. That’s the problem faced by Hope’s children, both employed, and by San Diego retiree Don Moore.

“It’s just terrible, the prices in the U.S.,” said Moore, who buys prescription eyedrops in Tijuana for his elderly mother. Two “very small” bottles cost $4.10 in Mexico compared to $30 in the U.S., he said.

“I checked all this with her ophthalmologist and said, ‘Is there any difference?’ He said no, so what’s the danger?” Moore asked.

Medicare does not pay drug costs for its 36 million elderly and disabled recipients. Under Clinton’s plan, the federal government would begin paying some part of those costs in 1996.

In recent years, some consumer groups, Clinton and Hillary Rodham Clinton have rebuked pharmaceutical firms for their pricing of certain drugs.

Until recently, some drug companies have had profits up to 15%, much higher than other industries. But U.S. companies defend the prices they charge.

A certain return is needed to pay for research to find new drugs and bring them to market. Drug prices aren’t rising as fast as research costs, said Dr. W. Leigh Thompson, chief scientific officer for Eli Lilly & Co. in Indianapolis.

“What we’re talking about is the research to discover the new drugs that will improve people’s lives,” Thompson said.

Dorothy Read, 73, doesn’t buy that argument. It’s distressing that elderly Americans must go to another nation to afford health care, she said.

The phenomenon isn’t unique to the Mexican border area. A recent report to Ontario’s health minister in Canada estimated that thousands of Americans cross illegally into Canada to take advantage of that nation’s free health care.

But U.S. health officials, including the Food and Drug Administration, warn they can only guarantee quality in the United States, not in other countries.

“A person who is older may have more than one medication,” said Laurel Eu, an FDA spokeswoman in Los Angeles. “It’s important to be monitored by a doctor and talk to your pharmacist.”

U.S. Customs regulations say that Americans must have a prescription to import drugs. They can bring back only a three-month supply for personal use.

But in practice, many Mexican pharmacies don’t ask for the prescription. And Customs is so busy it has little concern for anything but steroids, said spokeswoman Bobbie Cassidy.