Don M.
SF VIP
- Location
- central Missouri
Like most things in our current Health Care System, we pay twice as much for prescription drugs as most people in other nations pay. It doesn't take much imagination to figure out why....basically, it comes down to three reasons.
First, when watching TV, it seems that half of the commercials are for prescription drugs. These commercials cost the drug companies hundreds of millions of dollars per year....the cost of which is passed along to the people who take these drugs.
Second, it seems that after a few years, the side effects of these drugs kick in, and start causing more problems than the issue they are supposed to cure...and even deaths. At this point, the lawyers get involved with their multi-million dollar Class Action lawsuits, and the drug companies have to pay out many millions to cover these lawsuits. In order to do so, they pad the price of their drugs, so as to create the funding necessary to support the lawsuits they know will be coming. So, the person taking these drugs pays for advertising, and the lawsuits...up front.
Third, there are thousands of doctors who get kickbacks and perks from the drug companies based upon the number of prescriptions they write. Once again, the patient gets to pay for these "perks". This problem is becoming so commonplace that the web-site Propublica.org has had an ongoing project for the past few years to track the doctors who are prescribing excessive amounts of drugs.
So....the next time you see the price of a drug your doctor prescribes, think about how much the drug is really worth, vs., the extras our semi corrupted system adds to the overall costs.
First, when watching TV, it seems that half of the commercials are for prescription drugs. These commercials cost the drug companies hundreds of millions of dollars per year....the cost of which is passed along to the people who take these drugs.
Second, it seems that after a few years, the side effects of these drugs kick in, and start causing more problems than the issue they are supposed to cure...and even deaths. At this point, the lawyers get involved with their multi-million dollar Class Action lawsuits, and the drug companies have to pay out many millions to cover these lawsuits. In order to do so, they pad the price of their drugs, so as to create the funding necessary to support the lawsuits they know will be coming. So, the person taking these drugs pays for advertising, and the lawsuits...up front.
Third, there are thousands of doctors who get kickbacks and perks from the drug companies based upon the number of prescriptions they write. Once again, the patient gets to pay for these "perks". This problem is becoming so commonplace that the web-site Propublica.org has had an ongoing project for the past few years to track the doctors who are prescribing excessive amounts of drugs.
So....the next time you see the price of a drug your doctor prescribes, think about how much the drug is really worth, vs., the extras our semi corrupted system adds to the overall costs.