Posted on 06/30/2002 8:39:19 AM PDT by rdavis84
Prevacid is too expensive to make in this Country?
Those who take it know what Prevacid is for, but I'll give a link to it anyway ----- http://www.prevacid.com/ ------
I started Prevacid about a year ago. The Dr. who prescribed it gave me some 1 week blisterpaks of them to get me started and see if I tolerated it. These Packs had a lot of info on them that ARE NOT on the prescription bottle.
ONE PIECE OF INFO WAS THIS ----- "MADE IN CHINA"
That, to me, means that the finished cost of each capsule was on the level of Pennies each. The prescription costs nearly $4 per capsule.
Now note one of the "manufacturers" other medicine's history (LUPRON) ---- http://www.tap.com/
"(1) TAP Pharmaceutical Products Inc. ("TAP"), a major American pharmaceutical manufacturer, has agreed to pay $875,000,000 to resolve criminal charges and civil liabilities in connection with its fraudulent drug pricing and marketing conduct with regard to Lupron, a drug sold by TAP primarily for treatment of advanced prostate cancer in men. The global agreement includes:
(a) TAP has agreed to plead guilty to a conspiracy to violate the PrescriptionDrug Marketing Act and to pay a $290,000,000 criminal fine, the largest criminal fine ever in a health care fraud prosecution. The plea agreement between the United States and TAP specifically states that TAP's criminal conduct caused losses of $145,000,000.
(2) A federal grand jury returned an indictment unsealed today, charging one physician and six TAP managers with conspiracy to pay kickbacks to doctors and other customers, conspiracy to defraud the state Medicaid programs on TAP's obligation to sell products to those programs at its best price, and conspiracy to violate the Prescription Drug Marketing Act by causing free samples to be illegally billed to the Medicare program. The indictment charges that the TAP defendants offered to give things of value, including free drugs, so-called educational grants, trips to resorts, free consulting services, medical equipment, and forgiveness of debt, to physicians and other customers to obtain their referrals of prescriptions for Lupron to Medicare program beneficiaries, in violation of the anti-kickback statute. The indictment also charges that the TAP defendants aided and abetted, and caused the billings to hundreds of elderly Medicare program beneficiaries and to the Medicare program directly, for thousands of free samples of Lupron, used in the treatment of prostate cancer, in violation of the Prescription Drug Marketing Act.
(b) TAP has agreed to settle its federal civil False Claims Act liabilities and to pay the U.S. Government $559,483,560 for filing false and fraudulent claims with the Medicare and Medicaid programs as a result of TAP's fraudulent drug pricing schemes and sales and marketing misconduct.
AND ON AND ON (Don't suppose they could be doing that with Precacid, do ya?)
Here's a Quote ---- "The Medicare and Medicaid drug programs are bulwarks against the financial hardship that can be caused by the need for life-saving medical treatments," said Robert D. McCallum, Jr., Assistant Attorney General for the Justice Department's Civil Division."
Japanese technology, Chinese manufacturing, and US marketing weasels -- a typical arrangement.
I haven't bothered with the Dr. I figure she'll tell me to stop smoking and stop drinking soda. I suppose when I feel miserable enough, I will.
The country seems on a big integrity downhill everywhere art, entertainment, music, athletics, politics, law enforcement, business, Church leadership, public education. Turn around before the end of the Roman empire??
Good socialist thinking. However, in the real world, development and approval of drugs costs millions of dollars. The manufacturing price of the drug AFTER it is discovered and approved could be only a small cost -- but guess what -- somebody has to pay for the research and testing that went into the discovery and approval process.
Plus there are many "misses" in drug development -- things that don't work out -- you pay for those too. And then there are widely proscribed drugs and there are rarely proscribed drugs. The research costs may be equal, but all these misses, and unequally profitable drug development costs have to be paid for.
Where drugs have gone generic, competition beats prices pretty low -- so drug companies can only really make back their research and approval process expenses on new drugs for which they hold an initial production edge.
Now we could get Hillary as our maximum leader and she could prohibit the drug companies from charging high prices for their new drugs -- but guess what that would cause -- diminished drug research for lack of funds. I guess we'd have to turn over drug research to the government because "capitalism" doesn't work. huh?
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