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Drugmakers raise US prices on 350 medicines despite pressure

reuters.com

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Re: Drugmakers raise US prices on 350 medicines despite pressure

#41

Post by itsdrewmiller »

weslleyskah wrote: post #36
vjvjvjvjghv wrote: post #4

"Rome said the companies seem to be maximizing prices while negotiating discounts behind the scenes with health and drug insurers and then setting yet another price for direct-to-consumer cash-pay sales." This describes the biggest problem in US healthcare. No clear and consistent pricing. If we had a real market, you would get a prescription and then go to the seller with the lowest price. And everybody would get th…

Here in Brazil, we have something called 'Genéricos.' These are essentially the same medications as the brand-name versions, produced with the same chemical ingredients, but they often cost half the price, sometimes even cheaper than that. Insanely comical.

Those are available in America too

Re: Drugmakers raise US prices on 350 medicines despite pressure

#42

Post by pepperball »

blackbear_ wrote: post #11
KumaBear wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why does the US consumer of said medications subsidize many other countries who have access to the same medications for a fraction of the US sticker price?

Because US voters prefer the free market as opposed to government regulation and nationalized healthcare.

US voters have no principles. Even republicans started artistically screaming about nationalizing companies when they didn’t want to play ball with the president.

Re: Drugmakers raise US prices on 350 medicines despite pressure

#43

Post by mmooss »

gruez wrote: post #27
mmooss wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe drugs, or these drugs, aren't the most efficient solutions. Shouldn't we direct resources toward more efficient ones?

>Maybe drugs, or these drugs, aren't the most efficient solutions. Shouldn't we direct resources toward more efficient ones? Turns out all the low hanging fruit have already been picked, so the only "more efficient ones" left are stuff like gene therapy, which are absurdly expensive, but still theoretically cheaper than a lifetime of care. Unsurprisingly the high sticker price draws much backlash from the public and…

> all the low hanging fruit have already been picked

What is that based on?

Also, I'm not talking about 'low hanging fruit' necessarily; only solutons that become cost effective for vendors if drug prices aren't so extreme.

There's reason to think there is low-hanging fruit: Research is incentivized for the most profitable solutions for the vendors, not the most cost-effective solutions for patients.

Re: Drugmakers raise US prices on 350 medicines despite pressure

#44

Post by bediger4000 »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #29
dfxm12 wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rueters doesn't show a paywall for me. The source of the pressure described is in the headline though. I'm not sure why OP editorialized it (as it is against hn guidelines): Exclusive: Drugmakers raise US prices on 350 medicines despite pressure from Trump .

> not sure why OP editorialized it The article is about drug pricing, which is the part I found interesting (and by extension thought we’d find interesting). I thought taking it out both saved space and made the comments less likely to veer into flamebait.

Thanks for filling that in. I, too, am interested in this topic, because the oligopolistic market in the US, and the multinational corporations in the oligopoly, cause unusual, counter-intuitive and counter-doctrinal economic results. We're not in a recession or depression, so I was curious about causes of downward pressure on prices.

Re: Drugmakers raise US prices on 350 medicines despite pressure

#45

Post by munksbeer »

dfxm12 wrote: post #30
mystraline wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think its obvious: theres a LOT of love for Trump here in VC circles. So anything speaking ill of his laughable policies, EO's, and other garbage is -1'ed or flagged to oblivion.

If you choose to self censor a headline for fear of getting voted down on news.ycombinator.com, that says as much about you as the -1ers.

What does it say?

Re: Drugmakers raise US prices on 350 medicines despite pressure

#46

Post by lotsofpulp »

acdha wrote: post #34
lotsofpulp wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pharmaceutical companies, hospitals, and doctors are free to charge by the medicine, by the night, and by the minute. For example, this place does it: https://surgerycenterok.com/surgery-prices/ Insurance companies do not force the sellers to use complex billing practices, they would benefit from more transparent pricing (since they are seeking to pay less). The root cause is healthcare is inherently complicated and…

Don’t do pro bono PR for those companies. Healthcare isn’t so complicated that every other country in the world hasn’t been able to solve it for significantly less money and far less stress for users, not to mention better health outcomes in most cases.

Providing a chain of reasoning to support a logical conclusion is not “pro bono PR for those companies”. Claiming that someone doing that seems like an emotional kneejerk reaction to an idea that does not jive with the model of the world you would like to have.

I even provided an example of a healthcare provider choosing to be more transparent. It is always Eli Lilly’s choice to sell their medicine at a flat price to everyone. But it is also in Eli Lilly’s benefit to engage in price discrimination, so that they get paid more by people who can pay more:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_discrimination

Another example of this was when I was in college, US textbooks cost multiple times more than the international version of the textbook I could buy on Abe books or whatever website. Or, coupons for grocery stores. The insurance company has no hand in this.

To be clear, insurance companies also cause waste, because the government does not audit them, and the insurance companies are not staffed appropriately to resolve disputes in a timely manner.

Re: Drugmakers raise US prices on 350 medicines despite pressure

#47

Post by dfxm12 »

munksbeer wrote: post #45
dfxm12 wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you choose to self censor a headline for fear of getting voted down on news.ycombinator.com, that says as much about you as the -1ers.

What does it say?

That you have no spine, no conviction, mostly.

Re: Drugmakers raise US prices on 350 medicines despite pressure

#48

Post by weslleyskah »

itsdrewmiller wrote: post #41
weslleyskah wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here in Brazil, we have something called 'Genéricos.' These are essentially the same medications as the brand-name versions, produced with the same chemical ingredients, but they often cost half the price, sometimes even cheaper than that. Insanely comical.

Those are available in America too

So this must be worldwide. It seems like the patents held by big pharma are the root of the corruption. What is the guarantee here? That the chemicals are pure, or just that the companies are getting their cut?

Re: Drugmakers raise US prices on 350 medicines despite pressure

#49

Post by lenkite »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #46
acdha wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don’t do pro bono PR for those companies. Healthcare isn’t so complicated that every other country in the world hasn’t been able to solve it for significantly less money and far less stress for users, not to mention better health outcomes in most cases.

Providing a chain of reasoning to support a logical conclusion is not “pro bono PR for those companies”. Claiming that someone doing that seems like an emotional kneejerk reaction to an idea that does not jive with the model of the world you would like to have. I even provided an example of a healthcare provider choosing to be more transparent. It is always Eli Lilly’s choice to sell their medicine at a flat price to…

> it has a problem of supply being nowhere near demand,

Get rid of the patents and this will solve itself in no time.

> The insurance company has no hand in this.

False. Insurance companies in the US own stock in big pharma firms like Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson, Eli Lilly, etc. They maintain substantial investment portfolios and generate returns on premiums and reserves. They also have voting rights as institutional investors.

Re: Drugmakers raise US prices on 350 medicines despite pressure

#50

Post by ilamont »

itsdrewmiller wrote: post #41
weslleyskah wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here in Brazil, we have something called 'Genéricos.' These are essentially the same medications as the brand-name versions, produced with the same chemical ingredients, but they often cost half the price, sometimes even cheaper than that. Insanely comical.

Those are available in America too

But prices are going up. Look at the statements your insurance company provides about the reimbursed "cost" of covered generics:

Some experts report that PBMs overcharge for generics; The Wall Street Journal estimated that Cigna and CVS Health, both of which own PBM services, are able to charge prices for specialty generic drugs that are 24 times higher than what manufacturers charge.

https://www.americanprogress.org/article/5-things-to-know-ab...

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