How did this whole discrepancy in drug prices manifest itself and why should we trust Elijah Cummings to suddenly come up with a brilliant solution?
President Donald Trump is going to free the slaves!!!
Price gouging is the dirty secret the GOPe would like to sweep under the carpet.
How is negotiating drug prices against Republicans or free market? Or importing cheaper drugs?
Fed.gov gives Big Pharma oligopolistic control over the US drug market. They are part of our ruling, statist, oligarchy. Don't believe me? Dig into the history and details of how Mylan took the price of their Epipen from $8 a dose, up to $600, and you will see how politics, lobbying, massive government money and debt, and crony-capitalist law combine to drive drug prices through the roof.
How many time did Trump talk to Romney or Cristy.. And what came of it?
Sanctions on countries that clone the new drugs while they are on patent. Prices of new drugs are so high in this country because the American clientele has to pay the full fair for the R&D because other countries claim it is unfair that they have to pay high prices and threaten to copy the new drugs. The companies sell them at the generic price abroad because they can make up a little of the costs, it is a miniscule gain but not nothing, and they don’t “lose market share.” Without R&D being paid for during the patent period those new drugs would not be developed in the first place. In truth, as the USA is the only major country without socialized medicine in all its glory we are the target market for ALL drug development in all the pharma companies in the world. They have to get their costs repaid HERE because all the other governments have decreed that they cannot recover anywhere else. When we get Single Payer,, and we will, then pharmacological R&D will pretty much cease. Only the government will continue with it and the government will reduce then cease paying for it because those resources are “needed” for more lucrative uses, like vote buying welfare schemes. The populace doesn’t notice when drugs are not developed. They DO notice when an existing drug is too expensive. Single Payer will fix all that by eliminating development.
Mr. Trump should be learning where the other countries get their cheap drugs.
He will find out that more often than not it is from American Pharmaceutical companies.
Also, we need to revamp the “Use By”/”Expiration Date” criteria.
A drug is placed of the shelf at the local pharmacy and it sells for, let’s say $1 per pill. When it expires it is removed and sold overseas for about 5% of its original price. Keep in mind, it has been reduced in potency from 100% to 99%, because it is expired. Why can’t Americans buy these expired products for 5% or 10% of the original price? 99% potent is indistinguishable from 100%. Even 80% is probably good enough.
Didn’t the dems get pharma to support the ACA by agreeing not to negotiate drug prices or allow imports? Where was Cummings then?
And he should have been calling out both parties for a decade for allowing patent abuse/monopolies as long as the drug companies added “we may be able to help if you can’t afford this drug” to ads and then pay for the few poor people who ask for help while gauging everyone else.
There are good reasons that drugs are expensive - it’s expensive to research a new drug and many fail and profit on the successes pays for future research. For for a lot of reasons the US is often the first market and where early profits will come from to research new drugs. There are also lots of bad reasons that drugs are even more expensive - FDA requirements, law suites, ridiculous patent extensions plus doctors stopping generics from being used. And plenty of blame to go around, but also many possible areas from improvement if congress really wants to make things better.
One of the drugs I take sells to the insurance company for 900 bucks a month...My cost is 300...And that’s the generic version...If Trump or anyone can bring that price down, I’ll be elated...