Senator Bernie Sanders wants an investigation.
“Just coincidentally it happens that the three major suppliers of insulin seem to be raising their prices at the same exact time, at the same level. So I think you have to be very naïve not to believe there is collusion,” Sanders said.
Lets hope something comes of this, as the piece points out the people who pay full price are the ones who can least afford it. Incidentally this is a characteristic of our entire health care system.
My niece pitched this piece to CBS This Morning when the Epi-Pen pricing was reported and I sent her info on insulin pricing! I can’t say that it’s a direct result of her pitch, but it’s possible!
See also this ongoing thread about TUD users’ thoughts on the price of insulin (+ some other recent news stories on the topic are also shared throughout the thread): Novo Nordisk pledge re insulin price increases
How is it possible that the word PATENT is not mentioned in this piece? In the following years many PATENTS on modern insulin formulas will run out. The insulins Humalog and Lantus are already without patent protection. Lilly for example will be the first company to make a generic Lantus insulin available. All manufacturers know that the end of high profits from their older insulin portfolio is coming. Therefore they decided to increase the prices for the last five years. We have to understand that this is just a compensation for all the pain they will suffer in the years to come ;-). The only good thing is that time is on our side. Soon India and China will be happy to make affordable insulins available. For Humalog this might take while but they will get there. Patients disappointed by the behaviour of their current insulin manufacturer will make the switch without hesitation. This is how pricing can successfully alienate the customer base.
Well, in the US the patent mechanism has extra help in the form of the FDA’s classification of certain medications (i.e., insulin) as “biologics”. This allows the FDA, by bureaucratic fiat, to substantially throttle competition even after a patent has legally expired.
Okay, I watched the video. I need to go back and watch it again, because I could swear I heard someone from the manufacturers’ side of the debate say that prices are rising because there is price competition.
I couldn’t get the video to play, so I read the related story.
But Reilly [trade group rep] said, “When you look at the evidence, the competitive marketplace is working, and it’s working very aggressively to help keep drug cost increases in check.”
“I’m listening to that statement and I’m hearing consumers go, ‘Are you kidding me?’” Werner said. [Werner is a correspondent for CBS News.]
Big business loves to manipulate the marketplace to slant in their favor. It’s their method of operation. It doesn’t matter that they’re telling us to disbelieve our own eyes and believe their blatant lie. I can only hope that the grassroots awareness of this issue does not die before real action can be accomplished. I do feel badly for the trade group representative, Reilly. She works at a soul-sucking job.
Big business loves to endlessly pound home the mantra that the “free market” can fix all economic dislocations. Whether you believe that or not (that’s another separate and distinct debate), the fact is that nobody really knows because there’s never been a free market, ever (except maybe in the case of an Asian bazaar, and even that is arguable). There are always distorting factors in play, and in the case of health care in the US. the distorting factors are of monumental, breathtaking stature.
