Their movie got picked up by MTV.
I think some people here know something about this.
I was a bit surprised, myself, when I saw it. Was anyone at the Mpls screening? I left my sad little dog in the car. He had dog flu, so I couldn’t stick around to chat…although I would have liked to.
2 Likes
This is why you want to come out of the womb making $80,000 a year, if your diabetic. He was in paramedic school. That was never gonna cut it, although we DO need more diabetic paramedics.
While they have demonstrated incredible tenacity in phishing around for a concrete solution and gone down many paths to find it (like many of us), sometimes I wonder if drumming up bad PR for pharma does any good (because all Americans already hate the medical system). It can’t hurt in the next legislative session. I’m sure it helps. But, restructuring healthcare is so slow and difficult. We need to continue to seek solutions down many different paths, legislative, technological, and by using markets in creative new ways. Endeavors in all those area are experimental, but valuable. Do we have any other weapons of choice? We used to work heavily in tech, but lots of that work has subsided.
4 Likes
Interesting! Haha! Walken WALKING (and flying and dancing and shrinking!!). Who knew?
But on the insulin cost problem, I always wonder why that kid didn’t buy reli-on regular and NPH at Walmart, for under $30 a pop? That’s what I’d do, used to do, anyway. It wouldn’t be pretty. Best I could do using R and NPH was an A1C of mid eights, but this is so sad that he or his parents didn’t know. I was uninsured most of my adult life and bought my insulin without prescription from whatever pharmacy was near where my gypsy life took me. Cost about $25 each. Now as an elder with Medicare/Medicaid I can have the best system, CGM plus Tandem pump and GMO insulin, and at last I can actually control my blood sugar.
I will watch the documentary when it comes out. Thx for the heads up.
4 Likes
He was new. I always wondered by nobody told him, down at the Doc’s office that he COULD do that. No one tells people that except us. No one knows that if they are new. I wish he would have talked to us or that I had bumped into him. He lived not far from me. I went down to his school for EMT refreshers. It’s really unfortunate.
When did Walmart start selling insulin w/o an Rx? Because it hasn’t always been true that this was possible. It’s hard for me to remember when they started this. I’ve always wondered HOW they were able to set that up. You can’t do that at Walgreens or CVS…just Walmart.
Oh gosh. I’m so sorry. Too sad. 
Really? I didn’t know. So one has to have a prescription now? Not in Canada, unless things have changed in the last 15 years. I live near the border, and got my insulin there before I got insurance. I got insulin, no script, at Walmart within the last 6 or seven years.
Late 80’s or early 90’s I could buy R and NPH for 25 dollars. Insulin needles could be
bought over the counter. I think it varies by state. And it was not just Walmart. Major pharmacies as well.
When I was diagnosed (30 years ago), I needed an Rx for R and NPH.
I also needed an Rx for blood sugar strips. Strips were expensive.
I feel like it was about ten years ago Walmart started selling this stuff over the counter.
I have never located another pharmacy that sells insulin w/o an Rx. We still can’t buy syringes w/o an Rx. I’m going to write to Walmart and ask.
Its of interest to me because its a unique case. Why aren’t people dying everywhere because they are able to buy insulin w/o a Doc’s consent?
I hate keeping my Rx paperwork up to date. Walmart was a huge relief when they started doing this because it was a backup plan when the paperwork fell through. I would prefer that all insulin was available w/o an Rx, but they say that people will die. They say insulin is a potentially deadly medication (which is kinda true and it would be easy to murder people w/ insulin). But, it would be a huge relief from the burden on Docs and patients if that Rx paperwork was removed out of the process, or if an Rx lasted forever (because diabetes lasts forever).
Next time I pick up my insulin (local grocery store pharmacy) I’m going to ask about all this. 
1 Like
Yeah! Do me that favor. I’ve asked at Walgreens and they won’t do it.
It’s different than I expected, though. I didn’t know that Walmart OWNED ReliOn or that insulin product. They didn’t always. They must have purchased it.
1 Like
I love that Fat Boy Slim song! Christopher Walken dancing Fred Astaire old-school in that one. So much fun to watch!
1 Like
I want permanent prescriptions for my insulin. If Walmart doesn’t require an Rx, then its not that dangerous. I recognize that this has hang-ups on the insurance side, but that seems possible to overcome/work around.
From 2015
Walmart
There are also mfg coupon offers. I have been getting Novolog for $33/vial for last several years.
2 Likes
2015 sounds right. Thanks for that. I might not have known about it until 2017 or 18.
That clears up a lot - they bought it and rebranded it from NovoNordisk. That makes sense. I think they might have bought ReliOn too and made it OTC. Looks like Walmart carried it in 2012, but I think that brand was Rx when I was a kid.
So, is Walmart a huge, renegade diabetes advocate? That’s fundamentally what I’m wondering. Is Walmart a diabetes cowboy? I’ve kinda always imaged them as such, but its a strange visualization…that Walmart steps out of the smoke like some kinda gunslinger and does what no one else can seem to. And they do it without telling anybody. There was no publicity. They just kinda did it quietly, almost in secret. Why did it happen that way? How? Why can they do what no State or Federal government can do? It’s so confusing. How can they sell it with no Rx? Its only illegal in the state on Indiana. But, how? It’s never made any sense to me. Why can’t anybody else do that? I think they set a precedent. But how?
Maybe this happened…other people try to set precedent and then someone sues the ■■■■ out of them. Maybe Walmart has the resources to endue such a risk and they did and they walked into an industry as a goofy outsider and they succeeded and they did something profound.
I think the lower cost insulins started getting attention after this story.
And this article
Why Is There No Generic Insulin??
When I started insulin in 1965, I think it was $4 per vial (lente, nph).
Where I live you van get NPH and Regular insulin over the counter. Of course it’s the most dangerous insulin on the market.
Often the government moves drugs to the OTC category when they have been on the market a long time. And there is a need to get the drug to a population that won’t go to the doctor or who can’t afford it.
We have had humalog and novolog for almost 30 years. There is no reason to keep it prescription only except that so many people use it and the drug companies make billions from us.
NPh and regular? No so many people use it. It’s a good stop gap if I’m ever in a position of having nothing but in reality it’s not serving the greater public.
And just so you know, any pharmacy can sell those 2 insulins OTC. Even the brand names.
2 Likes
That’s kinda what I’m wondering about.
So, my lingering questions is this:
If you can sell the ‘dangerous’ ones without a Doc orchestrating everything, then why can’t you buy the less dangerous ones without an Rx?
This is a real point of confusion of me.
It’s because of money. They make hundreds of millions on analog insulins and they won’t give them up until they have something better.