Maybe I'm f. o. s., but I can foresee the possibility of of the demise of the healthcare "shopping-place" as the competitive edge gives way to continuing losses. Then, the healthcare "insuror" will become the government. Private insurance companies exist to turn profits; governments, by nature, never do.
Hey, Canadians! How is this sort of basket-weaving handled up there? imp
I personally think we have painted ourselves into a corner with no escape. Everything from a bottle of aspirins to major surgical procedures should be re-evaluated. I'm sure that the creation of the healthcare industry has helped the costs of healthcare reach new heights. During my hospitalization 2 mistakes were made one that could have caused a major set back and one not quite as dramatic but wasn't beneficial to me.
When I had surgery in 2011 I was poked, prodded and pushed from here to there for additional tests. Finally after I started to question the tests and refused a few of them they slowed down somewhat. I was given blood thinners until I had a nose bleed that almost put me under, I asked my surgeon to rethink any additional injections and he agreed. Prior to surgery I told them I reacted adversely to Zinc and when they tried to give me a second dose I refused. I survived their mistakes, albeit most were accidental but caused issues.
The other day I watched a commercial about a 1 a day pill to lower blood sugar and of course it followed with all the possible dire warnings about side effects. I looked it up on the website I search for drug costs in our area and found that I could buy the most expensive long term/short acting insulin at full retail cheaper than I could buy a month's supply of the pills ($440 vs $530). I also researched discovering that the $.18 glucose strips at Walmart are just as accurate as the $1.15 ones made by Bayer.
There is a video we were talking about where they are interviewing someone, about drug costs. What he was saying was that now the 'Baby Boomers' are entering their retirement years, you will see that prices for diabetic supplies dropping because the drug manufactures are realizing that the more repeat customers you can corral the higher your profits will be even at lower costs, the 3 main areas of health care with be for heart disease, cancer and diabetes. We have an epidemic in obesity amongst the elderly and near elderly which leads to all the above maladies. Competition for repeat customers will cause drug companies to realize that the more repeat customers they can maintain the more drugs they will sell, but if the costs are too high they will look elsewhere for the lowest price.
When I was employed we had a training seminar that used examples of how Walmart controls many product lines, where they can dictate quality and price. Walmart's customer base represent lower income and by volume selling will reflect in higher income for Walmart simply because they will sell more in bulk and set prices lower for the drugs that treat those maladies.
