Getting the medicine you need to stay healthy shouldn’t cost you a fortune.
You don’t want to be in one of those scenarios where you’re between your need for medicine and the lack of resources to pay for it.
So what happens? People turn to an online pharmacy and import their medicine from other countries, which is considered illegal.
Nineteen million Americans (eight percent of the U.S. population) do this to save money.
According to the FDA, the reason is that drugs that people buy from other countries aren’t approved by the entity for use and sale in the United States.
Have you wondered if you’re overpaying for a prescription?
Read on to find a definitive answer to the question.
Overpaying for a Prescription
President of the Commonwealth Fund, David Blumenthal, said the reason why drug costs are so high in the U.S. is that Big Pharma monopolizes prescription drug supply.
This monopoly power comes from patents granted to pharmaceutical companies for novel medicines.
When the patents are granted and take effect, drugmakers have monopoly pricing power for 12-13 years, and they can price them however they want. That results in far higher profits coming in for this sector than any other in the economy.
Drug companies will tell you that if they are not able to generate the exorbitant amount of revenue that they do, no new drug therapies could be created.
That begs the question: How much that innovation is worth it, and who makes that decision?
How Patients Suffer From Costly Drug Prices
High drug prices affect patients in two key ways:
First, high costs mean that patients can’t take their medicine. The Journal of Clinical Oncology conducted study years back that analyzed patients’ access to 38 different oral cancer drugs.
Thirteen percent of cancer patients chose to forgo approved chemotherapy drugs if the co-payment was $10 a month.
That percentage rose significantly to 67 percent when there was a co-payment of $2,000 or more. Insulin underuse was prevalent for 25 percent of diabetic patients due to cost in another study.
Second, the high drug prices distort research priorities and place financial gain ahead of health gains.
Cancer drugs are routinely priced at about $120,000 to $150,000 a year.
In 2019 alone, The U.S. was projected to have 1.76 million new cancer cases and more than 600,000 cancer deaths.
If you feel the costs of medicine are too high and you want to save money, the best online drugstore to consider is CanDrugStore located in Vancouver, British Columbia.
This internet pharmacy will help you save 80 percent off of your current drug costs, and you’ll love their refill reminder and refer a friend program.
Finding Farina Has More Must-See Content
Overpaying for a prescription is ridiculous. Prescription medicine is a necessity, not a luxury item.
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