[chicagolady]

What time does the next bus leave?
Is there room for 1 more?

[ATOMIC_PUNK]

This thread reads more like an advertisment than an article.I would make a great commercial!

[The South Texan]

Nuevo Progresso. Been going there all my life Park and walk across. All of the shops and the pharmancies are within six blocks of the bridge. People are friendly too unlike in some border towns.

[TomGuy]

After paying $290 for 2 prescriptions last month, followed by an additional $220 three weeks later for a renewal and a third prescription, I'd take my chances with Mexican or Canadian if I could.

I've checked some of their prices on the internet. For ongoing maintenance medications, it is worth ordering out-of-country. On one prescription name, Canada was about 1/3 the price of US.

Most Canadian prices seem to be about 30 to 40% less than US; most Mexican prices seem to be 40 to 50% less, depending on whether generic or name brand.

[FreePaul]

There are a number of mail order web sites for ordering from foreign countries. I've ordered several prescriptions for others and one medication for a dog. Some don't even require prescriptions although those in Canada do. All were between one-half and one-third the cost in the U.S. Packages were sent direct to the user and came from Canada, Australia and Thailand. I'm thinking of ordering my prescriptions in the future. The United States prescription drug user is being ripped off.

[Mark]

Rep. Ron Wilson, D-Houston, gave recognition to this ingrained form of drug-running.

So this Democrat would have no problem with them buying cigarettes there too. Avoiding the taxes saves them money also.

[TexasCowboy]

I made the trip to Progresso two weeks ago and went to the "Almost Free Pharmacy".
I buy my Prilosec over there at about a third of what it costs me here.
The Mexican Prilosec is just as effective as the American Prilosec.
The drug companies don't want people shopping over there because it takes away from their profit - pure and simple.

[Snowyman]

industry spokesman Grayson said. Also, prices are higher in the United States because that is where the drug companies recoup their costs for the research and development of new drugs, he said.

That's Baloney. I don't know about Mexico but drugs are not advertised in Canada and the pharmaceutical companies spend far more on advertising in the US than they do on R&D, which incidentally, is largely covered by tax incentives, out right grants and University research programs. And not all drugs are discovered and developed in the US

The US consumes 42% of the world's prescribed drugs, twice the Canadian consumption per person, and pays twice as much. The second highest net profit for industrial sectors was around 5-6%. For the pharmaceutical sector last year in the US profit was the highest , 18%.

[Dubya]

Can US residents purchase drugs from Canada?

Absolutely Yes. The FDA says US residents may import medications from outside the US provided certain conditions are met:

The product was purchased for personal use and does not exceed a 3 month supply.
The product is not for resale.
The intended use of the product is appropriately identified.
The patient seeking to import the product affirms in writing that it is for the patient's own use.
The patient provides the name and address of the doctor licensed in the US responsible for his or her treatment with the product.
The medication is not a controlled substance (sleeping pills, Valium, narcotics, etc.)
We not only meet these requirements but also the stringent Government regulations for the sale of prescription medications in Canada.

[Johnny Gage]

They do this in a big way at the arizona border too.

My folks were down there last winter. They met folks who save enough money on prescription costs to fund their trip back to arizona each winter.

[FairWitness]

According to an Act UP web site (not likely biased for drug companies):
"Overall profits of Fortune 500 companies declined by 53% in 2001, while the top 10 US drug makers increased profits by 32% from $28bn (20bn; 31bn) to $37bn, according to Public Citizen's analysis of the Fortune 500 data. Together the 10 drug companies in the list had the greatest return on revenues, reporting a profit of 18.5 cents for every dollar of sales, eight times higher than the median for all Fortune 500 industries, which was 2.2 cents."

Think about that folks. Taking that at face value, if the drug companies lowered prices just 20% across the board they would presumably end up with no profits. How do you suppose Mexico and Canada get to charge so much less? Would you like our U.S. companies to charge half of what they do and go out of business, or at the very least develop no new drugs?

[freekitty]

And what are these people and others suppose to do when no one can afford anything anymore?

[RISU]

I don't ghet it?

You mean there are some "Americans" that will not allow themselves to be ripped off, and are taking "direct action" to prevent that!

Shocking. Positively shocking!!

[Reelect President Dubya]

The real purpose of the controlled substance laws is to grant monopolies to pharmaceutical companies.

[MarkL]

Healthcare can be quite a hit on the pocketbook... In my case, before my company was bought out, and I became elligible for the company health care plan, I was self insured... Here's my old monthly health care bill (and I'm only 41 years old!)

Health Insurance Premium : $345.00 (This was after moving up to a $1500ded/$2500 max out of pocket rate. If I would have kept my old $500/$1000, it would have been $550.00)
Co-Payment for Medications: $118.00 (This is for medication I take daily for Crohns disease. It does not include any other "specialty meds"). FWIW, if I didn't have the insurance, my med bill would be roughly $425.00/month.

Monthly cost: $463.00/month.

My home mortgage payment is $465/month!

And my health insurance rates had gone up by at least 18% a year, for the last 8 years, even if I never used the insurance. For instance, the first two years that I had the insurance, my rates still went up by 18% and then 19%, even though I was NOT taking any meds, and didn't see the doctor, even for a check-up! The year following my back surgery, my insurance went up by 35%.

Mark

[dogbyte12]

How many millions were spent advertising "The Purple pill". The advertisements refused to even mention the name of the drug or what it was supposed to treat. The ads just asked you to ask your doctor if you needed the new purple pill.

What kinda crap is that? Their profit margin is by far higher than any other industry. They gouge the insurance companies who then end up gouging us. The most egrecious case is Claritan. They drug company fought it being put over the counter. They did not want people to have easy access to it, and for a good reason. They could not charge as much when people directly bought it, because they wouldn't pay the outrageous mark up.

I feel some sympathy for the companies, but when you look at tax breaks, tax funded research at universities, and higher profits than any other industry there is, I say let the seniors go to the border.

We do so much "pure research" at universities, the type of thing these companies would have to pay for themselves, that we as taxpayers are entitled to not being gouged.

These companies would not be selling the drugs in Mexico at the low price they do if they were losing money on the drugs even at the discount. We pay for their advertising, their R&D, and their high profit margins. Today we can get a better deal with a little drive. Oh well.

[Sonny M]

Simple question, why don't we use the free market system? There's a million and one online pharmacy's, and some of them are scams, but most are legit and located in canada, and mexico. You could have a law that allows anyone with a prescription, (which your doctor would have to verify before you can order) to buy there medications over the internet from US gov approved pharmacy's?

Something akin to one of those online travel sites that finds the lowest price. Before you could purchase however, the doctor would have to let them know you have a valid prescription, and there would be a need for safeguards to prevent fraud.

[Hank Rearden]

Looks to me like the only real problem here is the existence of the FDA. Between pharm companies' presumed preference to not kill their customers and liability-suit provisions, medical care ought to survive de-Stalinization just fine.

Of course, we have a President who happily signed legislation to continue Welfare Farmer and steel-subsidy programs, so I'm not holding my breath for a little more freedom from Big Stupid Government.

[Xenalyte]

True story.

About 15 years ago, Xena's Mom (who weighs approximately 20 pounds less than me, at my height) and her best friend decided to visit a "fat doctor" they'd heard about in Ciudad Juarez or Nuevo Laredo or similar.

They went down there and got in. The doc poked Xena's Mom in the thigh and said, "Fluid retention," or something that sounded like that.

Then he gave them each a brown lunch bag FULL of pills - loose pills, not blister-packed or anything.

XM's Friend tried them and went temporarily blind for three days.

Moral: if you're looking for Phenergan, go to Mexico. If you're looking for a good diet plan, try Atkins.

[Xenalyte]

Margie Cockrill, 76, is one of them. She crossed the Rio Grande on a luxury tour bus from Corpus Christi, wearing a purple pantsuit and a lapel pin in the colors of the American flag.

Note to Margie: purple does NOT match either red or blue.