Proposed settlement would save health plans $4 billion
A publisher of prescription drug prices has agreed to eventually stop publishing its controversial list of wholesale medicine prices, which numerous critics have blamed for driving up drug costs, as part of a settlement that alleged that it had conspired to increase markups.
In the lawsuit, plaintiffs alleged that First DataBank and McKesson arbitrarily increased the difference between what pharmacies pay wholesalers for prescription drugs and what they charge health plans and insurers. Pharmacies typically buy drugs from wholesalers at a price based on a benchmark called the wholesale acquisition cost. But the pharmacies charge consumers, insurance companies and health plans based on the average wholesale price.
In other good news on the drug front:
Prescription Drug Imports: Two Shots of Good News
Americans who buy their prescription medications from pharmacies in Canada got a double dose of good news this week. Federal officials will no longer stop people crossing the border with a 90-day supply, thanks to an amendment in the Homeland Security appropriations bill signed by President Bush on Wednesday. Mail-order prescriptions should also make a smoother crossing, as Customs and Border Patrol announced it will back off from its aggressive policy of seizing packages.
Everybody in the US should buy their drugs from Canada. The price difference is astounding!
Almost everything else is less expensive in the States.
The drug companies definitely have a right to laws protecting them from the “gray market”, the situation where they sell drugs to 3rd world countries at low or no cost, and the drugs wind up coming back to the US to be resold.
But Canada is not a third world country. The drug companies are free to sell their drugs at whatever “local” price they like, but they have no rights to say who can “enjoy” that price. To put it another way, if I go to Germany or Japan, and eat at McDonalds, I will and should pay the local price.
I know I’m stating the obvious, but I stand in shock that our government rules against it.
I have an idea: The execs of the drug companies should pay for things in proportion to their incomes. For example, if their income is 50 times the U.S. median income, then everything they purchase should be 50 times the cost. 50 cent pack of gum, that’ll be 25 dollars. I bet the discriminatory pricing would end real soon. (and yes, I believe progressive taxation is discriminatory and wrong in most cases as well).
Maye it’s a bit dull but could anyone provide some examples of prices either side of the border?
How does it work across the Mexican border?
How does publishing a list raise prices? Normally extra information lowers prices. Maybe we should extend this and have Kelley stop publishing their blue book?
#5,
When its a lie
Yea but cigarettes cost more in Canada! Maybe the taxes on smokes subsidize the drugs?
Drug prices, medical care, medical insurance, HMOs, etc… This whole industry is exhibit A in the case against unregulated capitalism.
“Hey now,” you say, “health care is very regulated!”
When laws are written by lobbyists for the health care industry, then no, it isn’t regulated at all.
#7, Yea but cigarettes cost more in Canada! Maybe the taxes on smokes subsidize the drugs?
Comment by Gyro Gearloose — 10/9/2006 @ 9:49 am
Nope, the extra taxation goes to paying for the “free” health care and paying down the national debt.
What most people don’t realize is that the majority of drugs are imported into the United States. Cypro, the antibiotic, is produced in Ireland and exported to North America, Europe, and elsewhere. The Cypro prescribed to a patient in Canada came from the same factory as what an American patient takes. The difference in price is that Canada sets the wholesale price considering the costs of manufacture, the development costs, and a realistic profit. The US allows the drug manufacturer to sell the drug at whatever costs he can get away with.
The truth is that it has been many years since a truly breakthrough drug came on the market. Almost all drugs arriving today are just variations of currently available drugs.
i always thought it was the advertising you constantly see is what drives the prices for these drugs up so much. Do we really need to see ads for things we can’t buy anyway?