“This was an unexpected victory in a long fight against an illegal cartel of three corporations who have raised their insulin prices in lockstep.”
The Biden Administration pleasantly stunned health care reform advocates Tuesday by including short-acting insulin in its list of 10 drugs for which Medicare will negotiate lower prices, power vested in the White House by the Inflation Reduction Act.
The IRA was passed in the face of one of the heftiest barrages of lobbying in congressional history, with the pharmaceutical industry spending more than $700 million over 2021 and 2022 — several times more than the second- and third-ranking industries — much of it aimed at stopping the legislation, watering it down, or undermining its implementation.
Dumb idea, I know nothing about this all. What about alternatively opening up across-the-border purchases, allowing people to legally buy from other countries at a fraction of current US prices. Drug companies can still set their US, uncontrolled prices at whatever they want, & no one has to buy it from them. It’d be like, a Free Market at work. I know this is oversimplified & there’s a lot of complications I’m not aware of, but, just a thought. Also, speaking of unconstitutional, isn’t group collusion to manipulate the market a violation of Sherman Anti-Trust law? Just saying.
How do you make sure the drugs purchased overseas are safe? FDA has pretty tight control over the industry in the US to maintain that here.
For sure a valid question. My presumption is that the same drugs legally produced & sold under that country’s regulations would have a reasonable factor of safety. Good enough for their own people anyway. I think also if I’m faced with the decision, no insulin because I can’t afford it, or drugs only approved to Country X standards, I’m already in a risky situation. For sure some people are already doing this & having to do so illegally.
This is, quite frankly, a very poor assumption depending on where you are getting your drugs from. For example, Dr. Reddy in India is the equivalent of buying a “Channel” knock off purse from China. It looks like the real thing, it might even somewhat function like the real thing. But it some serious flaws.
European drugs, alternatively, are often literally the exact same drug for cheaper because the EMA is much stricter about pricing. But there are also laws that prevent exporting it from EU countries just as there are laws preventing importing into the US. Because international trade is not open.
Source: I work in Pharma.