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Just last week Merck threatened to cut off drug supplies to Canada unless pharmacies could prove that they weren't exporting drugs to the US over the Internet.

Merck sells the same drugs in Canada as it does in the US at a cheaper price. What does that tell you? It tells me that Merck has no problem selling drugs cheaper in Canada because of bulk buying. They just don't want Americans to know about it. Which they will find out soon enough if they go to dotcom pharmacies.

Oh and in the US health managment companies are not allowed to negotiate lower prices by buying in bulk.

You're being ripped off.

Again half of the drugs sold in Canada and the US are produced by European drug companies so America is not subsidising Canadian drugs and Canada is not getting a free ride on new drug development.

Only 30% of Canadian drugs are proprietary the rest are old non patented generics.

Think beyond the box. Google is your friend.

How are we getting ripped off?

I saw a chart recently that showed basically the following:

25% of the cost is to research and development
25% is to distribution and manufacturing
25% is to administration and profit
25% is to advertising

I can understand a drug company advertising to doctors and medical personnel, but how many $millions go into those TV ads to the general public. Why? Prescription drugs require doctor's prescriptions, so why are so many millions of dollars spent advertising to patients at home?? Of course, the answer is to influence patients to insist on certain medications from their doctors. [Also, doctors get kickbacks for prescribing certain brands, etc. Drug sales are big business.]

Two things would help:

1. Cease all prescription advertising to the general public. People should not be requesting drugs based on TV ads; doctors should be the ones determining drug needs.

2. Require all drug stores to publish their prices. I was taking one prescript. The last time I went to my local to try to get it refilled, they jumped the price to nearly double. My $17 prescript now costs $29 (generic med). I can order the same from a US pharmacy for $12. The selling prices differ greatly. I have found other drug prices in my little town of 9,000 vary $10, $20 or more for the exact same prescription. Call around to various pharmacies and check their prices, especially if you have to pay full price.

How many drugs have you researched and produced?

You asked. I doubt if 2004-5 will be less .

"The pharmaceutical industry is one of the most R&D-intensive sectors in Canada. In 2000, Canada's brand-name pharmaceutical industry spent almost $1 billion on R&D. About 20% of this was on basic research conducted in company research facilities as well as across Canada in universities, hospitals and laboratories, and about 65% went to clinical research. In 2001 Canada accounted for 10% of the global new medicines discovered, despite representing only 1.8% of the world pharmaceutical market."

http://www.innovation.gc.ca/gol/innovation/site.nsf/en/in02587.html

How are we getting ripped off? We ask for these drugs.

You're absolutely right! We are fastly approaching a moral dilemma here in this country which is a combination of increasing healthcare/drug costs and the desire to sustain our lives indefinately. Sooner or later we as a population are going to have to make a decision between the two.

Do we choose to prolong the life of an elderly person who has already lived a full and satisfied life by spending literally hundreds of thousands of dollars in the last remaining year or two of their life or merely try to make them as comfortable and pain free as possible........

I'm only asking the question, I don't have the answer.