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A $20 drug in Europe requires a prescription and $800 in the U.S.

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Re: A $20 drug in Europe requires a prescription and $800 in the U.S.

#231

Post by inferiorhuman »

wrs wrote: post #175
cogman10 wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anyone know what's going on with the ACA marketplace? I like to take a peek at it every so often and it's just stupendously worse than employer healthcare. There is no plan in my market (Idaho) which doesn't have extreme out of network deductibles. The cost is also identical to what I and my employer pay for insurance. Is it just that the ACA is mostly used by sick people or something?

For one thing, as I understand it, the ACA was pretty effectively sabotaged by removing the mandate, which destroys the math that makes insurance work. Because pre-existing conditions have to be covered, you're free to wait until you have a serious (expensive) condition, then sign up for an ACA plan. And there's no mandate that spreads that risk around to healthy people, so the population is severely skewed. I have n…

The individual mandate merely guaranteed a captive audience for health insurance companies. That doesn't do anything for cost. What drives cost is the ACA limiting profits based on the cost of care, thus more expensive care equals more profits. Can you see where this is going?

Five states plus DC still have an individual mandate (ugh), and yes health insurance premiums are spiking there too. A large part of that is due to the tax credits (generously labeled subsidies) expiring – even with an individual mandate health insurance is prohibitively expensive.

Re: A $20 drug in Europe requires a prescription and $800 in the U.S.

#232

Post by ghostDancer »

terminalshort wrote: post #192
ghostDancer wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know, the problem with drugs in USA is the control a few corporations have over the politicians and the market, that's the reason health care and all related things are so expensive there compared to Europe.

I doubt it. The company probably would make more money selling it at 20 bucks at CVS to anyone who wants it than $800 per prescription.

People from USA always complaining about the excessive regulations in Europe but suddenly it's the USA that has worse and more excessive. It doesn't add up. And why it's another medicament like insulin much cheaper in Europe than in USA, doctors and politicians bought by big corp manipulating the market. Big pharma is an extortion racket and the USA is their field, now they want to export that model to Europe.

Re: A $20 drug in Europe requires a prescription and $800 in the U.S.

#233

Post by inferiorhuman »

monerozcash wrote: post #186
daveguy wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's because health insurance companies need to pad their profits. Because we have a backward system in the US where profits are extracted by everyone without any competition from a not-for-profit. That's why the idea of a public option is so popular (it was originally a Republican idea until it was decided insurance company profits are more desirable). Personally, I don't think any health insurance company should be…

Pretty sure Kaiser Permanente is not-for-profit, many Blue Cross Blue Shield members are non-profit

Most (and the biggest) BCBS licensees are for-profit. Kaiser is not but is still eye wateringly expensive. For me, a silver plan will be about $700-800 next year. And then you take a look at what a bronze plan covers…

Re: A $20 drug in Europe requires a prescription and $800 in the U.S.

#234

Post by inferiorhuman »

victorbjorklund wrote: post #78
xnorswap wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The best thing about universal healthcare isn't how much money I may or may not have to pay, it's that I literally don't once have to think about a bill or filling out a form to avoid paying too much. I wouldn't care if I ended up paying more in tax than I would in an insurance model. The benefit is being able to 100% focus on my health instead of navigating a system to try to reduce what I'm paying. When you're diag…

Trust me it doesn’t work perfectly in other countries. Yes, americas system is messed up but in countries like Sweden you will still have to navigate the system to actually get the healthcare you need. There are people who are denied healthcare in Sweden because the govt has deemed that it’s too expensive to save them (while people with similar conditions and a good insurance in the US are covered).

All of that happens in the US, the big difference is that if you get care you stand a good choice of going bankrupt. The largest single reason for bankruptcy in the US is medical care and of that group the largest chunk is folks who previously had insurance but no longer do.

Re: A $20 drug in Europe requires a prescription and $800 in the U.S.

#235

Post by inferiorhuman »

dpkirchner wrote: post #157
eszed wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The public option works to set a roof on what private insurance can charge. Exactly! This is what no one in the US seems to understand. My encounters with private clinics and hospitals in the UK (all 10+ years ago, at this point) were unbelievably luxurious, at prices that (totally, completely free-market driven, mind you) were affordable on middle-class incomes. Or, yeah: there's private medical insurance, also fr…

Unfortunately a lot of us do understand this, but our representatives (who definitely know this) don't care or are actively opposed to making improvements other than reducing taxes (which hurts more than helps, IMO).

Looks at Nancy Pelosi

Re: A $20 drug in Europe requires a prescription and $800 in the U.S.

#236

Post by WarOnPrivacy »

Aurornis wrote: post #8

FYI for anyone who isn't familiar with the wacky US insurance situation: Nobody in the US actually pays $800 for the drug. That's the "list price" for insurance companies to pay. Even insurance companies don't pay that price because they negotiate their own rates with the drug companies, which are lower. Then the drug companies come in and offer a "savings card" which you apply at the pharmacy like another layer of i…

> Nobody in the US actually pays $800 for the drug.

The lowest I can buy this drug for is $819.26.

Period.

> That's the "list price" for insurance companies to pay.

$819.26 - $893.72 is the actual price (range) I must pay if I want to purchase this med.

Period. The tales to the contrary fell apart the moment they were scrutinized.

> Then the drug companies come in and offer a "savings card" which you apply at the pharmacy like another layer of insurance.

No. They don't. They pretend to. It is a lie, as delivered.

The manufacturer (Miebo) has a discount program. Miebo promises my cost for the eye drops will be ...

..."as low as $0"

But below that we are told this deal only for Eligible Commercially Insured Patients.

The ones with insurance that pays for the med.

This American, on the other hand, will pay $819.26 - $893.72.

Despite endless hints that there are pharma industry cards all over the place for the millions of millions of us who pay 100% out-of-pocket, there aren't.

What there are: Tightly bounded programs, primarily for newly released and evergreened drugs. Generally the discounted cost is still more than the nearly identical drug they're trying to replace.

> The FDA is partially to blame for this situation:

Not in a meaningful way. Even Dodge vs Ford is a greater factor. Even the stinking DEA does more harm to out of pocket drug consumers (because it does that harm ceaselessly).

> The cost of [ ... parrots pharma's trivially debunked talking points about why US Drug Consumers Must Get Gouged... ] back from insurers.

No. ref: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle...

Analysis of ref: https://www.csrxp.org/dose-of-reality-new-study-debunks-big-...

Re: A $20 drug in Europe requires a prescription and $800 in the U.S.

#237

Post by xnorswap »

victorbjorklund wrote: post #78
xnorswap wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The best thing about universal healthcare isn't how much money I may or may not have to pay, it's that I literally don't once have to think about a bill or filling out a form to avoid paying too much. I wouldn't care if I ended up paying more in tax than I would in an insurance model. The benefit is being able to 100% focus on my health instead of navigating a system to try to reduce what I'm paying. When you're diag…

Trust me it doesn’t work perfectly in other countries. Yes, americas system is messed up but in countries like Sweden you will still have to navigate the system to actually get the healthcare you need. There are people who are denied healthcare in Sweden because the govt has deemed that it’s too expensive to save them (while people with similar conditions and a good insurance in the US are covered).

That may be, but I'm speaking from experience in my country.

Almost 10 years of treatment for a health condition, and the only forms I've ever filled in were:

    1. Legal risk document to say I understood the risks of treatment
    2. Change of address form
    3. Form to say I wouldn't impregnate people while on a certain medication
And honestly, that's it. I've genuinely been able to focus on my health without being bothered by forms.

Re: A $20 drug in Europe requires a prescription and $800 in the U.S.

#239

Post by christkv »

Insanity wrote: post #221
fy20 wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, and in my country you can even mix and match it. I went to see my GP, paid for by public health, they referred me to a specialist. I chose to pay €100 to see a private doctor who was available sooner (the next day) and had better ratings. They referred me for an MRI which was done at another private provider, paid for by public health. I went back to the private doctor and paid for a non-surgical treatment, wh…

Honestly one of my main healthcare related complaints about living in Canada is not having centralized health records. Sometimes Europe feels like living 2 decades in the future lol.

Depends in the country. The Spanish system is completely siloed as the competence of health is by region and they all run their own systems

Re: A $20 drug in Europe requires a prescription and $800 in the U.S.

#240

Post by reformd »

Aurornis wrote: post #8

FYI for anyone who isn't familiar with the wacky US insurance situation: Nobody in the US actually pays $800 for the drug. That's the "list price" for insurance companies to pay. Even insurance companies don't pay that price because they negotiate their own rates with the drug companies, which are lower. Then the drug companies come in and offer a "savings card" which you apply at the pharmacy like another layer of i…

job creation and Arbeitsbeschaffungsmaßnahmen. berry cool
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