Reading Room Document

Exclusion of Medicine and Medical Supplies From Controls Under the Export Administration Act of 1979

Congress intended the exclusion in § 6(f) of the Export Administration Act of 1979 for medicine and medical supplies to be absolute, and did not intend to limit it by imposing a strict standard of human need. The President has broad discretion to determine whether particular exports are medicines or medical supplies within the exclusion, subject only to the limitation suggested by the concept of basic human need. The OLC does not provide release dates for its opinions, so the release date listed is the date on which the opinion was authored. The original opinion is available at www.justice.gov/file/24636/download.

November 13, 1980