261–270 of 333 posts
Meanwhile, CVS + Walgreens lost $6B in market cap on the news Amazon is moving directly into pharmacy space. It's crazy how competitive Wall Street views Amazon moving into a market; have there been examples of Amazon making a large purchase/move but completely failing? (sure there are, just not coming me off the top of my head)
Large parts of PillPack were being mismanaged into the ground, I trust Amazon can fix them but at the same time my first reaction to the news was to text my non-programmer-or-management friends there about when they’re quitting. If Amazon’s warehouses or Whole Foods are any indication of how they’ll approach the unavoidable human work involved at a pharmacy, I have serious doubts about the quality of service. And pil…
What unavoidable human work at pharmacy? Authenticate patients and ship them prescriptions. Even CVS is doing it now.
I used a mail order prescription service for a while (ExpressScripts). It was awful. They routinely lost, failed to ship, or double-shipped packages, and I got multiple bottles of pills that had expired due to being left in the heat. I, personally, will never trust mail order prescriptions again.
Meanwhile, CVS + Walgreens lost $6B in market cap on the news Amazon is moving directly into pharmacy space. It's crazy how competitive Wall Street views Amazon moving into a market; have there been examples of Amazon making a large purchase/move but completely failing? (sure there are, just not coming me off the top of my head)
CVS is down 8% right now, Walgreens is down 9%, and Rite Aid is down 10%. Investors are very nervous right now.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
From a consumer adoption standpoint, the only thing standing in Amazon Register's way was a lack of marketing. As a merchant, it was amazing. They offered promotional rate of 1.75%, which is basically impossible to beat for any small business. For context, Square and most "simple pay per swipe" merchant service providers charge 2.75%. If you go out and get a really good deal from a intrchange+ provider, you might be…
My credit card cash back is 2.00%, your 1.75% promotional rate was losing them money.
This is interesting because Amazon isn't exactly known for supply chain integrity. Who here hasn't received fakes from Amazon? If you rely on a specific medication for your health, is Amazon a brand you trust to deliver it? How long until they start commingling pills and shipping random counterfeit/fake product to users? Hope it never happens but if they do with pharmaceuticals what they did with everything else they…
This is a very ill-informed opinion. The supply chain is very strictly regulated for pharmaceutical medications. Do you really think that Amazon can get their stock medications from just anyone? Do you think there is no oversight on this kind of thing? The DEA doesn't fuck around. They take all of this stuff very seriously. Commingling medications? Really? In a pharmacy, medications are NEVER allowed to be commingled…
The disadvantage is that there are some leftover pills most of the time. E.g. you need 30 pills and there are only units of 20 available.
This is interesting because Amazon isn't exactly known for supply chain integrity. Who here hasn't received fakes from Amazon? If you rely on a specific medication for your health, is Amazon a brand you trust to deliver it? How long until they start commingling pills and shipping random counterfeit/fake product to users? Hope it never happens but if they do with pharmaceuticals what they did with everything else they…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is a very ill-informed opinion. The supply chain is very strictly regulated for pharmaceutical medications. Do you really think that Amazon can get their stock medications from just anyone? Do you think there is no oversight on this kind of thing? The DEA doesn't fuck around. They take all of this stuff very seriously. Commingling medications? Really? In a pharmacy, medications are NEVER allowed to be commingled…
What always seemed odd to me in such a wasteful society as the US: counting pills. Really? In many countries you get blisters. No counting. I suspect in some European countries it would actually be illegal to do this. The disadvantage is that there are some leftover pills most of the time. E.g. you need 30 pills and there are only units of 20 available.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is a very ill-informed opinion. The supply chain is very strictly regulated for pharmaceutical medications. Do you really think that Amazon can get their stock medications from just anyone? Do you think there is no oversight on this kind of thing? The DEA doesn't fuck around. They take all of this stuff very seriously. Commingling medications? Really? In a pharmacy, medications are NEVER allowed to be commingled…
What always seemed odd to me in such a wasteful society as the US: counting pills. Really? In many countries you get blisters. No counting. I suspect in some European countries it would actually be illegal to do this. The disadvantage is that there are some leftover pills most of the time. E.g. you need 30 pills and there are only units of 20 available.
This is the exact reason why they count pills. You have a prescription for X pills, you get X pills.
It's been a while since I've had a prescription filled, but I think that in New Zealand it's the same. Most prescription drugs like opiate painkillers or antibiotics are counted and bottled.
There are some interesting security issues in the underlying systems that pharmacies like PillPack use. Here is a security advisory for PillPack from 2015: https://wwws.nightwatchcybersecurity.com/2015/04/30/advisory... Basically the system that pharmacies used to transfer prescriptions isn't secure
You're basing this off a 3yr old security review of a 2yr old startup (at the time: founded in 2013, reviewed in 2015)? Got anything more recent? 3yrs is a lifetime in startup years. Plus they now have plenty of money to hire the best security firms to pen test their systems, plug holes, and run a serious monitoring operation.
Also read the advisory - the issue is not with them - it's with the legacy prescription transfer systems they hook into. That is something they cannot hire someone to pentest without getting all of their competitors to agree.