General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsConsumer Reports: A Surprising Way Big Pharma Keeps Drug Prices High
Ten years ago, consumers were on the verge of getting a lower-priced, generic version of the brand name antibiotic Doryx (doxycycline). But the drug's manufacturer, Warner Chilcott, stopped making the drug in its original capsule form and instead began producing it as a tablet. This seemingly minor change meant that generic manufacturer, Mylan, was blocked from being able to market the matching generic tablet it had been developing.
Warner Chilcott is now embroiled in a lawsuit that charges it used those and similar tacticssuch as adding score lines to the tablets and ceasing production of the unscored tabletsto manipulate the patent and generic laws to stay one step ahead of generic manufacturers.
That tactic, called product hopping, is a strategy drug makers have begun using in recent years to stall the development of generic versions of a medication so they can keep brand-name drug prices high. But it is coming under fire from the Federal Trade Commission and several consumer groups, which charge in a federal court case that its a violation of antitrust law that bilks consumers of millions of dollars in high drug prices.
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THE REST:
http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/health/suprising-way-big-pharma-keeps-drug-prices-high
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My comment:
And Republicans want to GUT Medicare due to high prices and increasing costs. AS IF MEDICARE were the problem. MEDICARE is NOT the problem! GREEDY big drug companies and insurance companies are the problem. It is absolutely necessary to REGULATE the f*ck out of them so they cannot do this type of crap (including raising the cost of a drug thousands of a percent overnight) and then costs will stop rising so much or go down.
Big pharma does this type of thing in the US because it's the ONLY country where they CAN do it -- where there are no regulations stopping them. The majority if not all the enormous profits they make selling drugs are made from US sales -- particularly Medicare Part D -- which cannot negotiate for lower prices or buy the same drugs cheaper from other countries such as Canada.
THE FACT that big corporations - including big drug companies - control our government is the ONLY reason this crap is still allowed here. We have GOT to get RID of corporate control of our representatives - get our government back under control of "We the People" (and NOT the corporate ones). That's the only way this gets fixed once and for all.
truedelphi
(32,324 posts)This crappy situation?
Triana
(22,666 posts)COLGATE4
(14,732 posts)Governmental immunity - you can't sue the King unless the King consents. Still the law today.
GeorgeGist
(25,321 posts)Ferd Berfel
(3,687 posts)WE will never have anything to say about it again, short of armed insurrection
jwirr
(39,215 posts)because of this.
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)cantbeserious
(13,039 posts)Eliminating medicare makes that job easier all around.
PatrickforO
(14,577 posts)SINGLE
PAYER
HEALTHCARE
And by the way, the punitive damages assessed against these greed heads need to be so huge, so intrusive, that they will NEVER engage in this kind of reprehensible price gouging EVER AGAIN.
LiberalArkie
(15,719 posts)lifestyle befitting their autocratic positions.
Dont call me Shirley
(10,998 posts)Enthusiast
(50,983 posts)TryLogic
(1,723 posts)If organized crime created a health care system, what would it look like? How would it work?
People would have to pay for protection -- call it insurance.
People would be steered into taking drugs that are difficult to stop taking. Once started in drugs (called medicines), they would gradually find themselves taking more and more drugs they could not stop taking.
People would be charged very high prices for necessary medical help such important tests and procedures. Prices for many medicines would be outrageously high.
The crime bosses would buy and otherwise influence politicians who would then protect them and their profiteering.
Honest doctors would be pressured into helping the mob maximize profits, for example, by not mentioning alternative procedures that would have to be performed elsewhere, or by selling the more expensive surgical procedures and tests that need not be done, and by scaring patients into getting such procedures.
There would be rampant advertising by drug companies to brain wash naive citizens into asking for various drugs that would supposedly provide magical benefits.
erronis
(15,303 posts)Could be said also for many industries and corporations. Telecommunications and the monopolies. Sole-supplier for DoD weapons systems. Real estate, resource hording by the banks/financial companies.
When someone has a "friend" in congress, you know they both are crooks.
hopemountain
(3,919 posts)unavailable for nearly 2 years. the only available thyroid by prescription was compounded and not covered by insurance - at a price of anywhere from $45 or more per month. the synthetic had been available for under $10 per month. pharmaceutical companies claimed the synthetic ingredients had become "unavailable". when synthetic and generic thyroid options came back on the market the price was anywhere from $20 per month to over $100 per month.
Scuba
(53,475 posts)Is this yet another example of an Obama failure to clean house in 2009 instead of leaving Bush appointees in charge of our regulatory agencies?
Triana
(22,666 posts)Former Monsanto Vice President Michael R. Taylor is the current Deputy Commissioner for Foods at the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA)
The Great Corporations run and control the US Gov't. We people talk about "One World Order", which the TPP and TISA and other approaching trade agreements codify worldwide, they must realize that the entire world and most governments in it will be under complete corporate control.
What about the rest of us? Well. We're just setting ducks. We're the hosts The Great Corporations feed off off from before we're born to after we die and every moment in between.
Greed is God.
Nothing else matters. Hell on Earth is here now.
Gormy Cuss
(30,884 posts)and if we had single payer we'd see drug prices come down in a heart beat.