🚀 go-pugleaf

Seth Hammond wrote:
> <theodoric3@lycos.com> wrote in message 
> news:1170724298.477370.284360@a34g2000cwb.googlegroups.com...
>> On Feb 5, 3:25 pm, "Jim Higgins" <gordian...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>>> Needy seniors still have trouble getting 
>>> drugshttp://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/health/drugs/2007-02-04-assi...
>>>
>>> Eight months after Congress implored pharmaceutical companies to restore
>>> programs offering free drugs to needy Medicare recipients, advocacy 
>>> groups
>>> say that some patients are still having trouble.
>>> "Before the Medicare program, we had close to 4,000 seniors getting free
>>> drugs," says Patricia White, executive director of the West Virginia 
>>> Health
>>> Right clinic in Charleston, W.Va. "We're probably down to 400 now."
>>>
>>> The issue arose after many drug companies halted their assistance 
>>> programs
>>> for Medicare-eligible patients once Medicare's drug benefit began last 
>>> year.
>>> The drug companies feared running afoul of federal anti-kickback rules if
>>> they did not. Since then, Medicare officials and other regulators have 
>>> said
>>> such programs can be set up in a way to avoid violating any laws.
>>>
>>> Currently, some drug companies, including AstraZeneca, GlaxoSmithKline,
>>> Merck, Pfizer and Wyeth, offer help to Medicare members. Income limits 
>>> and
>>> other rules vary, as do which drugs are covered. Dozens of other 
>>> drugmakers,
>>> however, bar Medicare-eligible patients from assistance programs.
>>>
>>> In May, several members of the Senate Finance Committee met with top
>>> executives from eight drugmakers, urging them to continue the assistance
>>> programs.
>>>
>>> "A company ought to be ashamed if it's still using (the Medicare drug
>>> program) as an excuse to abandon people with these extraordinary needs,"
>>> Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, said in a written statement Friday.
>>>
>>> About half of the members of the Pharmaceutical Research and 
>>> Manufacturers
>>> of America provide assistance to Medicare members, says spokesman Ken
>>> Johnson, but many are still concerned about the legality of doing so.
>>>
>>> Affected Medicare members include Mary Morey and Pat Martinez of 
>>> Charlotte.
>>> "It's like I have fallen through a crack," says Morey, 67, who takes 10
>>> drugs for diabetes and high blood pressure.
>>>
>>> Her $15,000 annual income is under the $19,600 limit for assistance 
>>> through
>>> Merck's and Wyeth's programs. Still, letters from Merck and Wyeth have 
>>> told
>>> her she doesn't qualify. Wyeth has a requirement that applicants, or 
>>> their
>>> doctors, write a letter stating they have a hardship. Morey has asked her
>>> doctor to write a letter.
>>>
>>> "Every month, before it's time for Social Security to come again, I run 
>>> out
>>> of food money," she says.
>>>
>>> Martinez, 76, takes 19 drugs. The insulin she needs for diabetes comes 
>>> from
>>> samples her doctor gives her. One of her drugs is made by Glaxo, which
>>> requires patients spend $600 on drugs before being eligible for 
>>> assistance.
>>>
>>> "Pat doesn't have $600 to spend, so she can't qualify," says Susan 
>>> Basini,
>>> executive director of MedAssist, a free pharmacy for uninsured and
>>> low-income residents of Mecklenburg County, N.C. Martinez works part time 
>>> at
>>> MedAssist.
>>>
>>> --
>>> "Your best, last and only line of defense-a cohort of Roman Heavy 
>>> Infantry"
>> Stop complaining, that money is helping illegal aliens and other
>> worthies.
>>
>> gregory
>>
>>
> 
> It looks to me as though the answer may be for America to allow in all 
> approved and inspected pharmaceuticals made elsewhere.  We could call it 
> Free Enterprise, Free Market, Global Economy - whatever you like.  American 
> manufacturers should jump at the chance to compete on a level playing field. 
> Competiton always improves the breed....
> 

The same product manufactured in the same facility can be sold at widely
varying prices here in the USA and overseas.  Remember all those people
going to Canada to get the same drug for a lower price?  

Up until a few years ago (about the time that we started hearing about how
big a difference in price exists for the same drug here vs. other places)
the asthma medication inhalers used to have the USA drug company's name on
them and the country where they were manufactured (commonly England).  Now
they only have the USA drug company's name on them.

And remember the flu vaccine shortage that was caused by production problems
at a facility in England?

Free markets are like free presses.  You can have one if you own it.


-- 
Being slightly paranoid is like being slightly pregnant -- it tends to get worse.
Molly Ivins