The Wizard Behind The Curtain – Addendum To Drive Home The Point

February 14th, 2019 by Tom Lynch

Among other things, yesterday’s post made a point about the way the PBM system (if you can call it that) makes it difficult for uninsured Type 1 diabetics to buy insulin, because of price. To beat that horse even deader, here is an excerpt from a Kaiser Health News article, in partnership with NPR, published yesterday entitled, Insulin At A Fraction Of US Cost:

Almost one year to the day after her daughter’s diagnosis, Lija Greenseid and her family were visiting Quebec City, Canada, in July 2014. Her daughter’s blood sugar started spiking and Greenseid feared her insulin might have gone bad, so she went to a pharmacy. With no prescription and fearing that her daughter’s life was on the line, Greenseid was prepared to pay a fortune.

Instead the box of insulin pens that normally costs $700 in the U.S. was only around $65 or so.

“At that point I started tearing up. I could not believe how inexpensive it was and how easy it was,” Greenseid said.

“I said to [the pharmacist], ‘Do you have any idea what it’s like to get insulin in the United States? It’s just so much more expensive.’ And he turned to me and said, ‘Why would we want to make it difficult? You need insulin to live.’”

The more Greenseid traveled with her family, the more they realized how inexpensive insulin was everywhere except in the United States. In Nuremberg, Germany, she could get that $700 box of insulin pens for $73. The same box was $57 in Tel Aviv, Israel, $51 in Greece, $61 in Rome and $40 in Taiwan.

“We get so accustomed in the United States to thinking that health care has to be difficult and so expensive that people don’t even consider the fact that it could be so much easier and less expensive in other places,” Greenseid said. “In fact, that is the case in most countries.”

Take a moment out of your busy day and think about that. Please.

And answer this question: Do you  believe America’s 1.3 million Type 1 diabetics  who require insulin every day ─ just to stay alive ─ should be forced to pay hundreds, even thousands, of dollars a month for that medicine? Or are they not worthy enough to be treated like their fellow diabetics the world over?

Tags: