Diabetics have no choice; if we can not obtain insulin, we die.
YES, I AM A DIABETIC.
My drug store costs, despite having very good insurance, is hundreds of dollars each month. If I were living on Social Security and Medicare, I would not be able to treat my disease and would die.
Insulin is not the only drug I need but the price of insulin should be cheap. The original discovery in Canada’s Banting Institute, was licensed as a non profit. That insulin was purified from animal pancreas but decades ago molecular biology brought us the technology to make human insulin. That process was patented. Those patents have expired.
Nonetheless,,, over the last year the price for insulin has gone up by almost 30%. The justification? The manufacturers claim that they need the INCREASED profit to spend on new drugs. Put another way, these companies claim the right to tax diabetics to offset the investor’s risks for developing new products.
Another part of the problem is the “American Diabetes Association.” While the donors community sees the ADA as a sponsor of research and a patient advocate, the ADA has become its own bureaucracy largely funded by a mix of the drug companies and health care providers whose sole interests are often not the same as the interests of patients. One group of patients, the parents of children with diabetes, founded an alternative .. The “Juvenile Diabetes Foundation.” As a patient myself I donate only to the JDF because it funds research.
Tom Davidson FACEBOOK
My Mom saw that article in the Seattle Times yesterday. I have no noticed an increase because I have very expensive insurance, and my co-pay hasn’t changed.
I take three kinds of insulin. The most expensive is Levemir, which is basically identical to Lantus. Without insurance, it would be about $275/bottle.
There are so many forces that go into the price of pharmaceuticals, it is hard to understand.
My parents are on several medications each. There is one that my Mom takes that was $700/month. She checked with Costco, and it was $60. Go figure.
My parents also get prescriptions filled in Canada for a fraction of what we pay here. No telling how much longer the Canadian tax payer is willing to continue to subsidize our medicine.
I don’t know the answer. If it were just simple greed, that would really beg the question – why wait until 2014 or 2015 to jack the price? They could have been gouging us years ago, and the Board of Directors didn’t demand it?
There have been times when I was ready to throw in the towel, and support more government control, but then something like ObamaCare happens, and my premium went from $991/month to $1,591/month after being promised I would save $2,500/year.
Adding insult to injury, I had to find a new doctor, after being told, “You can keep your doctor.”
Being cynical, sometimes I figure that since we don’t have any problem racking more trillions in national debt, why not just implement cradle to grave care for everyone, and raise the debt limit to cover it? Who would have predicted that the debt would damn near double in 8 years, and no one from either party would suggest doing anything about it.
I wish I had the answer. I am, more and more, considering the benefits of complete government control of healthcare, but the government doesn’t have a great track record of competing with the private sector, and would we really want to government to control it?
It may be better for me because of my pte-existing condition, and that of two of my three kids, but just because it might benefit me, that doesn’t necessarily make for good government policy.