Novo Nordisk, a Danish company, objects to a government decree ordering a 25% price cut in all medicines.
A campaign group has condemned the move as “brutal capitalist blackmail”.
More than 50,000 Greeks with diabetes use Novo Nordisk’s product, which is injected via an easy-to-use fountain pen-like device.
Ironic, considering the advertising slogan for Novo-Nordisk is “Changing Diabetes”…sounds like a lot of the same old exploitation to me…On the other hand, it’s not mentioning there are other fast acting insulins that can be used in pen injectors - what does Eli Lilly have to say about this?
The owners of corporations have a right to sell products at a price that will give them a profit, and to choose where to allocate their resources of capital, labor, and product. The state should not be allowed to fix prices.
I have some thoughts concerning this situation.
A government controlling costs of medications for its citizens does not make products scarce. Pharma intent on raking in the huge profits they do make products scarce when they are forced to not take advantage of their consumers. Other companies make insulin pens, so if Novo would rather make zero dollars in Greece, rather than just making a little less than they were, then let them make ZERO. Greed eventually has a way of biting corporations - Toyota, BP, and hopefully Novo-Nordisk.
Disturbing news.
Sadly healthcare is about the bottom line, regarding Mr. Panayotacos’ letter. It’s a business like any another, though lives & quality of life is at stake. That’s the problem. Imagine if the water supply was controlled by corporations, or roads. Only those who could afford it would have access to water or traveling to work. A simplification, but these things are available to all equally because they’re considered essential. Somehow medicine is not considered an essential necessity.
Wish the article contained more detailed info. If Novo is only pulling their pens, it’s not critical. If other pharm companies follow Novo’s lead & pull products, it will be disastrous for people dependent on their meds.
Big deal offering free glucagen.
The state controls prices on many things. There are caps on gasoline, natural gas, and other utilities. Price gouging is against the law during natural disasters.
The banks just finished a nice round of selling mortgage based securities that damn near sank the world economy - and people are now asking the state to step in.
There are cases where we need state control.
Free market and profit are fine when the users of a product have a choice in whether to buy or not to buy. People on insulin do not have that choice. Unless you think they should be “permitted” to choose between life and bankruptcy… which, of course, is a lose-lose proposition.
Novo Nordisk ALSO has a choice, and a much simpler one than most people with diabetes. They can make innocent people who need their product to live suffer over profits, or they can do the humanitarian thing and negotiate some sort of compromise solution (which, by the way, would be a major public relations coup, as opposed to the hit they’re likely to take). Sometimes, doing the right thing morally is more valuable to a company than profit margins. I know what I’d do, in their situation… but clearly the executives at NN are choosing otherwise. Pity we don’t use their products because I’d happily boycott.
Actually, another company IS pulling out of Greece because of the 25% cut price! Leo Pharma said it has decided to stop offering two popular drugs because the price cuts would cause job losses across Europe. To read more about this (short read) - go to this link
If you go to the link for Leo Pharma they are attempting to find alternative drugs for the Greek market, but still, so unfair. We didn’t ask to become diabetic, and why should we suffer when companies are pulling out due to their profit loss.
From what I can tell from Leo Pharma they seem to deal in skin disorders, e.g. diabetic dermopathy which is a skin disorder that causes changes in the small blood vessels. I’ve had this before in the past when I was younger, with patches on the front of my leg. No discomfort, but irritating, and infection can occur if the patches open up. I still have the scars to prove it!
Because I’d posted this story at Diabetes1.org where I work from time to time - someone replied to my blog saying - " Have you considered that it’s not the pharmaceutical companies at fault, but Greece’s government for forcing them to cut their prices by 25%? ". They’ve got a point, but still, I don’t feel it’s right.
There is also a petition online that Mark Clifford (from One Disease! World Voice! ) and I decided to get going the same day the news release came out. If you feel like signing it (and you can sign anon) and saying your own two cents worth (I did - you know me - I love to write) - just go to this link.
Anna \^^//
You think it is right for the government to tell a company to lower itys price? If it was a terribly profit making opportunity there would be 100 manufacturesr and the market would drive the cost down! So if it is right to force a lower price, how about a 50% cut or why not 75% Or if we were really altrustic, then why not give it away free. Before you judge the companies, consider how you would likely react if they told you that your salary was to be cut by a like amount. Many would likely change employers!
don’t laugh… i was in the hospital for a surgery just over a year ago and the nurse tried to give me a Glucagon injection to bring down my blood sugar. I had to fight her to bring any insulin to begin with after they served me a meal full of carbs, and when she finally showed up, she had a Glucagon kit and my BS was at 350! I wanted to beat her with my dinner tray.
Food is also essential and if the government was toarbitrarily cut the price of food, there would be those that would find it no longer profitable to farm and guess what we would have less food. We need to let the market run and regulate costs thru market forces, competition and reasonable regulation. It is theft to tell an individual or a company that you must sell something for 75% of X that you produce at a cost of X.
Where government provides a benefit to the needy, they should properly reimburse the provider of the goods and services. Society needs to do a value judgement of what they choose to reimburse. In a perfect world, we would all have all the food clothing shelter transportation, energy and fuel that we need along with the best of Mediocal Care. Unfortunately that perfect world exists not and the theories of Marx have been disproved in society after society. Hopefully some day there will be a fairer world but today the capitalist system has provided more prosperity to more people than any other society in the history of man.
If the pharmacuticals do not make a profit, where will the next generation of new medicines that we value come from. Who will invest the millions to develop these products when there is no return on investment. ohhhh dirty word return on investment!! I think everyone here expects a return on their investments (anyone have an IRA or $)!K Retirement plan) no matter how modest they are. It is only fair to provide a reasonable return to those who develop the products that we so value and allow uys to live a better life. My sister died (Diagnosed 1949, deceased 1974 - remember the testapes - thats all they had) because of unavailability of the products we now take for granted. Without an incentive for profit, no one would of developped the wonderfil Pumps, Insulns, Glucose meters and CGM’s that so many of us take for granted.