Medication Costs
- onestepatatimemhrn
- Jan 15, 2022
- 2 min read
I used to complain about paying £8.70 per item I was prescribed in England.
In Canada and the States, they have it so much worse!
Did you know that two months of one medication can cost absolutely anything? Or take my wife for example, she needs a weekly injectable in order to help with her arthritis. If she didn't have insurance she'd have to pay over $1000 a month for this medication.
Why is this?
Well, it's the pharmaceutical companies.
Today, drug firms fund and supervise clinical trials to evaluate drug safety and effectiveness. Their incentive to obtain authorization to market drugs and to promote their use once on the market, can bias the clinical trial design, oversight, conclusions, and reporting of results. What options exist to eliminate this bias?
• The income of drug firms, their key executives, and drug detailers rise as drug sales increase, even if drugs are prescribed for unapproved uses and/ or used inappropriately. This incentive even encourages the illegal promotion of unapproved drug uses. What financial and legal changes could create incentives for drug firms to encourage appropriate drug use and to identify and report problems with drug safety?
• To promote research and development, patent laws protect drug firms from competition and tax subsidies increase their profits. These incentives, however, are not directed to particular kinds of patents (such as new molecular entities) or particular kinds of research, or the development of new therapies and so may not effectively stimulate activities that policymakers seek. What changes could direct incentives more appropriately?
• Drug firms provide substantial discretionary funding for important medical activities such as continuing medical education, medical research, medical journals, and professional medical societies. Pharmaceutical firm funding, however, can compromise these activities and bias their direction. How might changes in the control or direction of funding reduce or eliminate these risks?
Drug companies on average spend about 20% of all their sales revenue on R&D.
The pharma companies argue they have to bear the risk of developing experimental drugs that never make it to market.
But how is it fair to limit access to much needed medication purely because the average human being can't afford it?
I say, it isn't.
And that is why, in Canada, we have insurance, if you can afford it that is. We also have insurance companies that charge you an arm and a leg for a plan. Take Blue Cross in Alberta for example. I took out a plan with them at a time when I had no health care coverage from the province, no income and serious health struggles. They charged me $178 for a months coverage. Which in turn covers 80% of my medication costs, however I am fortunate enough that my medication costs per month are infact lower than my monthly premium amount was.
So in my opinion, insurance companies are just as bad as pharmaceutical companies.
Medication shouldn't be about money but it turns out, it is.
If you have opinions on this I'd love to hear from you. Send me an email at onestepatatime.mhrn@gmail.com
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