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Posted by burnt-resistor 17 hours ago

Suspension of the de minimis administrative exemption for imports $800 or less(www.personalimportation.org)
https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2026/06/24/2026-12...
158 points | 140 comments
kimos 15 hours ago|
This is actually tragic.

I worked for an online pharmacy in Canada for many years, and it’s fraught and full of grey areas for sure. But so so many Americans count on importing generics to afford their medication. You’re talking several times the price difference for the same pills, life changing amounts of money for older people on fixed incomes with health problems. They will simply not be able to access their medication anymore.

bitshiftfaced 31 minutes ago||
You're claiming that generics tend to be cheaper in Canada than the US. What are you basing this belief on?
PunchyHamster 15 hours ago|||
I'd imagine even with duty added they'd still end up being multiple times cheaper
hexapus 14 hours ago||
Yeah, it would...and yet, they covered that as well with another recent change: Packages from foreign and Canadian online pharmacies will be prohibited from entering the U.S. if the same medication is sold domestically or if the foreign pharmacy targets U.S. buyers.
kimos 14 hours ago||
It is rarely enforced though. And the pharmacies will just replace it and ship it again.
xethos 11 hours ago||
It was rarely enforced, prior to what GP explicitely called out as a recent change, that will come into effect October 22. We'll see what happens by end-of-year, though I wouldn't count on pharmacies replacing and re-shipping
jojobas 14 hours ago|||
Are we talking duties imposed on the generics, or generics imports outright banned?
bayarearefugee 17 hours ago||
goes into effect 12 days before a midterm election that is already starting to look like a blue tsunami.

It's a bold strategy, Cotton. Let's see if it pays off for 'em.

biglyburrito 16 hours ago||
Never interrupt your enemy when they are busy making a mistake.
tremon 15 hours ago||
Never assume your enemy is making a mistake either, unless you possess the gift of perfect knowledge.
amanaplanacanal 13 hours ago|||
Hard to see how making things more expensive for consumers is not a mistake, but I could totally be missing something.
pseudohadamard 12 hours ago|||
It's not just making it more expensive, it's tying every single little thing that comes into the country up in an endlessly-growing loop of red tape that CBP has no way to handle. The de minimis exemption in most countries isn't motivated primarily by not hitting the little guy but by the fact that trying to enforce it for millions of low-value items would bring postal systems to a standstill.
tpm 3 hours ago||
This was exploited from the other side by sending billions of low-value packages, so now the EU adds €3 per article category (so 2 shirts = €3, 1 shirt and 1 spoon = €6) to every package that's under other customs thresholds (€150 usually). With the view this will be eventually replaced by automating the tariff calculation for every package in a few years.

As a result, the number of imported packages dropped anywhere from 30% to 80%, we'll have to wait for the full numbers, but there is a reason to expect something similar will happen in the US.

tancop 5 hours ago|||
It's a strategic decision. Pharma companies promised campaign donations if Trump can make sure their profits go up.
oliculipolicula 12 hours ago|||
you'll soon find out that I'm _also_ the bond market

--Scott "The House" Bessent maybe?

sanp 15 hours ago|||
Assuming there is no chicanery
ModernMech 3 hours ago|||
They are not planning on winning any more elections from here on out, I don't know what other people saw on J6 to make them think that's not the strategy from now on, whenever they lose an election.
adastra22 15 hours ago|||
midterms are in November?
mmh0000 12 hours ago|||
People are downvoting you.

But I'm assuming this was a joke about the conspiracy that midterms will be canceled one way or another due to a "national emergency". Which, sadly, is much more probable than it should be.

jacobolus 15 hours ago||||
"The compliance date for 19 CFR 145.12(a)(2)(v) and (vi) is on October 22, 2026"
parl_match 14 hours ago|||
wait until you find out what month is before november lol
cyanydeez 16 hours ago|||
you're assuming media gives a lick about doing more than soundbites. The actual affect will be at best, 2 weeks after this is implemented, but probably 2 months while they actually figure out what legal means they can to infer which packages they can safely claim are foreign, along with actual foreign pharmacies giving 2 shits about todays shipping.
yieldcrv 15 hours ago||
10 years of believing your color coded wave of choice is going to happen and still winding up with a 50-50 senate

the seats necessary to alter that aren't even open, how gullible do people have to be? well, not very, independents are the largest bloc now, but of the remaining partisans... hello? your algorithm is fake

gs17 14 hours ago|||
> the seats necessary to alter that aren't even open

Seems to be anyone's win right now: https://www.realclearpolling.com/maps/senate/2026/toss-up (and RCP is considered to be conservative).

bryanlarsen 14 hours ago|||
Nate Silver now has it at a 66% chance that the Dems take the senate. (https://www.natesilver.net/p/expert-ratings-are-ignoring-sig...)

Granted, 66% chance is still essentially a toss up.

yieldcrv 14 hours ago|||
a 51% Senate gets to do agency appointments, judge appointments, and particularly SCOTUS

but it cant pass any laws. they’re still cooked by the filibuster (until they get bored of it)

stouset 12 hours ago||
SCOTUS has an unassailable majority unless Democrats grow a spine and pack the court or multiple conservative members have serious and unforeseen health issues. Neither seems all that likely.
_DeadFred_ 13 hours ago|||
'Kamala is no different than Trump, and she didn't earn your vote, you should just stay home' vibes.

We have learned Kamala was in fact much, much different than Trump, and many peoples rights have been trampled because of this sort of nonsense fatalism.

yieldcrv 11 hours ago||
the adults are talking about the Senate, one of the chambers of Congress. Has almost nothing to do with the President, especially not how they are elected.
Perenti 14 hours ago||
The hoops you poor Americans have to jump through to get affordable health care is ridiculous in what is presented as a developed nation.
solfox 14 hours ago||
The hoops are in place to ensure those at the top continue to get their take.
expedition32 7 hours ago|||
It is deliberate. Americans want the hoops because they hate poor people.
stvltvs 17 minutes ago||
And we don't realize that we are the poor just because we can point to poorer people.
bdangubic 13 hours ago||
you said this as if we were developed nation :)
happyopossum 16 hours ago||
There's nothing in the CBP rule that prohibits importing prescriptions, although there will no longer be a duty exemption for them. The rule is about suspending the 'de minimis' exemption for shipments valued under $800...
hexapus 14 hours ago||
Starting Oct 22, packages from foreign and Canadian online pharmacies will be prohibited from entering the U.S. if the same medication is sold domestically or if the foreign pharmacy targets U.S. buyers.
telotortium 14 hours ago||
Source?
loeg 15 hours ago|||
Wasn't that already suspended in, like, 2025?
PaulDavisThe1st 13 hours ago|||
SCOTUS ruled that the executive order that included it was illegal. So it went away, even though they never ruled on the specifics of the de minimis system. Now it is back, under a different EO.
yibg 15 hours ago|||
I believe it had a phased rollout, which impacts all parcels soon.
seemaze 14 hours ago||
I was charged $46 of import fees on a $137 of art supplies from the Czech Republic this May.
dashmeet 14 hours ago||
Now is a good time to mention:

costplusdrugs.com

I have no affiliation. If anyone wants a domestic alternative to low cost pharmaceuticals this is a good one. Also sometimes GoodRx is worth checking out. Don’t hesitate to ask a pharmacist for a discount if you’re not using insurance. Sometimes that is the best price.

thelastgallon 11 hours ago|
https://youtu.be/YvEH8zENOos?si=jROCWiVgT-YBeuI_
mikeweiss 14 hours ago||
Canadian pharmacies are duct tape for Americas broken health care system. If we rip the tape off first without a fix we're gonna be in trouble.
xethos 10 hours ago|
Or it means everyone has to deal with just how broken the system is, together, regardless of whether you knew the and could take advantage of the cheap way or not

Not that it'll play out like that, America still has a wealth inequality problem that will insulate some that would otherwise push for a less-broken system. But I'm optimistic by default, and the bright side is more people complaining, loudly, at how broken America's health care system is, and pushing for a fix.

jacobgold 14 hours ago||
I know very little about this topic, but maybe this ultimately helps force a real solution to our prescription drug cost problem?
thayne 13 hours ago||
There are so many problems with American healthcare that should have forced a real solution. But nothing much has happened.
amanaplanacanal 13 hours ago||
I suspect the only thing that would make people demand a better solution is if we got rid of employer paid health care. If everyone had to buy from the exchange, people would freak out.
thayne 11 hours ago||
The fact your health insurance is tied to your employer is the source of many of the problems.
mikeweiss 14 hours ago||
But how long would the real solution take if it ever comes and what would the collateral damage be while we wait?
downrightmike 16 hours ago||
What does this actually mean?
trashface 16 hours ago||
Various pharmacies in Canada will accept a US prescription and send you the medication via mail, usually at far cheaper than what you would pay for the same in the US.

This prevents it.

CubsFan1060 15 hours ago||
Interesting. Got some examples of the pharmacies?
burnt-resistor 9 hours ago|||
https://northwestpharmacy.com
k12sosse 15 hours ago|||
Okay Kash, you almost got him this time.
jmspring 14 hours ago||
It’ll likely be a rep hit but - I’d argue livestock imports and booze imports over pharma would be Kash’s interest.
motionlessveloc 16 hours ago|||
Means you can no longer legally^W practically buy far cheaper prescription medicines from Canada, Mexico, India, China etc and ship them to the US.

Their own primer on the topic: https://www.personalimportation.org/understand-the-issue

dawnerd 16 hours ago||
That’s not what it says. It’s still legal. You just have to pay duties. It’s also not just on medication. They shared these rules a while ago too.
BHSPitMonkey 15 hours ago|||
Well... the legal route is no longer "far cheaper" than domestic supply.
matthewdgreen 15 hours ago|||
Canadian pharmacies already pay tariffs. What does this actually change?
reddozen 15 hours ago||
Your comment is nonsense.

Canadian pharmacies pay Canadian tariffs. Americans pay American tariffs. American importers are no longer exempted from paying American tariffs applied by the US government for goods de minimis goods they import from Canada.

This post is about American importers no longer having exemption on tariffs they would have otherwise paid to the US government.

At no point has Canadian pharmacies ever paid American tariffs. This is fiction you invented.

matthewdgreen 15 hours ago|||
I don’t know what you’re saying, but for those confused. Starting in 2025, the de minimis exception was removed. This added delays to purchases of drugs from Canada to the US, and required consumers to pay new duties. These duties were collected by the pharmacies at order time, or at least my experience was that the pharmacies would charge your card for them. This is the common sense understanding of what I said above.

These duties were annoying but bearable. However these new changes will effectively shut down all consumer orders of drugs from Canada starting on Oct 22. So if you need these drugs to stay alive, order them right now.

PS This new rule is going to put my family’s health at risk and I’m deeply pissed about it. Having some HNer pick this moment for pedantry is incredibly on brand.

reddozen 2 hours ago|||
> I don’t know what you’re saying

And that's the problem. It doesn't get much more simple than "Canadians pay Canadian import taxes" and "Americans pay American import taxes". Can you at least recognize that reality? For any country, its own people pay its tariffs.

> required consumers to pay new duties.

Required American consumers to pay new American levied duties.

matthewdgreen 1 hour ago||
This is an article about new rules for US consumers purchasing drugs for mail delivery from Canadian pharmacies. I understand that you want to make some point about the situation for Canadian consumers, and I appreciate that. But I think you should post that to the other thread, the one that deals with that topic.
LastTrain 14 hours ago||||
Nobody is being a pedant. How you phrased it is wrong and, more importantly, politically charged.
tremon 15 hours ago|||
> This is the common sense understanding of what I said above.

It's very dangerous to assume common understanding here when Trump has been loudly claiming the opposite, i.e. that the tariffs would be paid by the sender rather than the importer. It would have been more accurate to state that "Canadian pharmacies have already been including the tarrifs in the total order cost".

CosmicShadow 13 hours ago|||
As a Canadian that sells products to the US I can say that we absolutely pay tariffs to the US government in place of our customers who should be paying it, depending on what shipping provider you use. USPS doesn't have the infrastructure or care to collect tariffs, so they won't, meaning the shipper has to just pay them up front and either jack the shipping cost by an arm-and-a-leg or just eat the cost. Canada Post even requires you as the shipper to pay them. If I ship UPS I can have the buyer pay upon delivery. It's 100% bullshit. I'm luckily under CUSMA, but the first month of tariffs when no one knew what was going on I paid out the ass on shipping and never got any refunds for it like Americans supposedly did, I just got fucked. In Canada and most other places it's normal to pay tariffs and duties when you order anything international (upon delivery) and all carriers know how to collect at delivery (or collect ahead of time online), but the US does not and it's alien to them (as seen by many customers screaming bloody murder over a $4 duty fee that anyone else in the world would kill to only have to pay).
actionfromafar 16 hours ago||
The people in charge betting they only need to count the "red" ballots this time?
Blackthorn 15 hours ago||
Hasn't it effectively been suspended for over a year now?
pants2 15 hours ago|
Yes, and it has driven the decline of Temu and Shein
expedition32 7 hours ago||
It has fuelled Chinese exports to Europe. The enormous industrial capacity of China hasn't gone down they've simply rerouted the cargo ships.
gigel82 14 hours ago|
This was the case for at least a year. I used to use AliExpress for affordable small electronics, and when this came into effect, it killed the whole thing (and my hobby, because no way I'm paying the Amazon or eBay tax).
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