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Why a Pill That's 4 Cents in Tanzania Costs Up to $400 in the U.S

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Re: Why a Pill That's 4 Cents in Tanzania Costs Up to $400 in the U.S

#121
post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

McDonald's can have 24/7 drive though windows while selling burgers and fries, but most pharmacy's are not open close to 24/7.

Burgers and fries don't require clinical trials.

Neither do drug distributors aka pharmacy's. Remember, this is a retail operation they could be selling guns and the only change is the type of regulations and who their suppliers are.

Re: Why a Pill That's 4 Cents in Tanzania Costs Up to $400 in the U.S

#122
post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

McDonald's can have 24/7 drive though windows while selling burgers and fries, but most pharmacy's are not open close to 24/7.

Pharmacists cost a lot more to employ then a couple of 17 year olds

The gap is less extreme than you might think. You can get a pharmacist for less than 4 teens making 15$ an hour.

But again mostly you need to get your drugs in the day.

Re: Why a Pill That's 4 Cents in Tanzania Costs Up to $400 in the U.S

#123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your view of economics does not match reality. A survey of hundreds of published economic studies and legal decisions of antitrust authorities found that the median price increase achieved by cartels in the last 200 years is about 23%.[1] Private international cartels (those with participants from two or more nations) had an average price increase of 28%, whereas domestic cartels averaged 18%. Less than 10% of all ca…

My view of cartels matches non-academic reality. Here's one: OPEC here's a non-member ( which is basically a cartel by itself) fucking it for them: US Here's another cartel: Siemens and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Here's a competitor: Hyundai Heavy Industries When real world meets economic studies, economic studies get clobbered

You wrote:

If there was there would be a competing cartel as it is the case everywhere.

Providing two examples of where there are competing cartels is not an argument that this phenomenon occurs everywhere (emphasis originally yours). Your logic is off.

Re: Why a Pill That's 4 Cents in Tanzania Costs Up to $400 in the U.S

#124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please let us know what is "working" for US citizens about the current system.

You pay, you get healthcare. Yeah, it's not cheap, but your max out of pocket for 2017 with a marketplace plan is just $7150. https://www.healthcare.gov/glossary/out-of-pocket-maximum-li...

My wife and I both had insurance when our son was born-- and gold plated insurance, at that. I still went back and forth with the hospital for over a year arguing about bills, until they sent us to collections, even though they owed us $800 for overpayment. I had to threaten to take them to court before it was resolved. Our son was walking, and they still hadn't figured out how to bill us for it.

I'm still not 100% sure they aren't going to resurrect those bills in another 6 months.

Re: Why a Pill That's 4 Cents in Tanzania Costs Up to $400 in the U.S

#125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anything approved in both countries ought to be OK, no?

You are describing this: Canada->US, approved US->Canada, approved i.e. Canadian companies are successfully selling to the united states medicine that is manufactured in Canada and is regulated by the US. US companies successfully selling products to Canada that are manufactured in the US and regulated in Canada. If we had a reciprocity then we would have: US->Canda->US auto-approved Canada->US->Canada auto-approved…

I’m saying that even if we don’t have reciprocity, if the drug is separately approved in both countries, it should be legal to buy in Canada and take to the US.

Re: Why a Pill That's 4 Cents in Tanzania Costs Up to $400 in the U.S

#126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're confusing GDP with taxes https://randomcriticalanalysis.files.wordpress.com/2014/11/t...

No, I'm not. As indicated in my link, Americans pay the highest per-capita costs (be it via premiums/copays, taxes, etc.) for healthcare in the world.

No way Americans pay more in taxes than most of Europe. That's absolutely not true. If you want to compare to third world countries, I suggest you try and live there before telling us how great it is.

You also have to consider that the US develops most novel drugs and therapies, by a wide margin. Are you taking and Chinese or Russian or African drugs? Neither do I.

Re: Why a Pill That's 4 Cents in Tanzania Costs Up to $400 in the U.S

#127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, I'm not. As indicated in my link, Americans pay the highest per-capita costs (be it via premiums/copays, taxes, etc.) for healthcare in the world.

No way Americans pay more in taxes than most of Europe. That's absolutely not true. If you want to compare to third world countries, I suggest you try and live there before telling us how great it is. You also have to consider that the US develops most novel drugs and therapies, by a wide margin. Are you taking and Chinese or Russian or African drugs? Neither do I.

You can't compare Europe's total taxes with just American healthcare costs. They've made similar choices to pay for stuff like college via taxes instead of privately that heavily affect that comparison.

Americans pay more than Europeans (and anyone else in the world) for healthcare. This is demonstrable fact.

edit: Here, look at this one.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:OECD_health_expenditure_p...

We're paying as much or more than most of the OECD in healthcare from a tax perspective, then adding on a bunch of private spending they don't have, for a total spending wildly larger than any of them.

Re: Why a Pill That's 4 Cents in Tanzania Costs Up to $400 in the U.S

#129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My view of cartels matches non-academic reality. Here's one: OPEC here's a non-member ( which is basically a cartel by itself) fucking it for them: US Here's another cartel: Siemens and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Here's a competitor: Hyundai Heavy Industries When real world meets economic studies, economic studies get clobbered

You wrote: If there was there would be a competing cartel as it is the case everywhere. Providing two examples of where there are competing cartels is not an argument that this phenomenon occurs everywhere (emphasis originally yours). Your logic is off.

name other cartels and i will provide their competitors

Re: Why a Pill That's 4 Cents in Tanzania Costs Up to $400 in the U.S

#130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are describing this: Canada->US, approved US->Canada, approved i.e. Canadian companies are successfully selling to the united states medicine that is manufactured in Canada and is regulated by the US. US companies successfully selling products to Canada that are manufactured in the US and regulated in Canada. If we had a reciprocity then we would have: US->Canda->US auto-approved Canada->US->Canada auto-approved…

I’m saying that even if we don’t have reciprocity, if the drug is separately approved in both countries, it should be legal to buy in Canada and take to the US.

No, because our system of approvals does not treat re-import the same as direct import.
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