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Monday, November 16, 2009
Boomer with Attitude / News Drug industry gives America the finger
Posted By John Grooms on Mon, Nov 16, 2009 at 3:40 PM
“When we have major legislation anticipated, we see a run-up in price increases.” According to the New York Times, that’s how Stephen Schondelmeyer, a pharmaceutical economics expert at the University of Minnesota reacted to the news that drug companies have raised prices an average of 9 percent in the face of upcoming health care reform. In other words, Schondelmeyer is saying, that’s just the way these guys work. When there’s a chance the government could cut into the industry’s obscenely high profits, up go the prices. Researchers at Harvard found the same kind of price increases after Congress added drug benefits to Medicare earlier this decade.
Oh, and the “agreement” the drug industry had with the White House to cut $8 billion per year from America’s drug bill via rebates to seniors and the government? You guessed it -- this year’s 9 percent price increases cancel out the agreement’s first year savings.
Writer Timothy Egan wrote a piece last week in which he noted that more and more Americans are angry because they now feel that our system – our social contract, if you will – is rigged against them, to the benefit of large corporations. Personally, I wonder what’s taken folks so long to make the connections, but with drug companies and health insurance companies gouging consumers for all they’re worth and more – not to mention taxpayer-rescued financial giants giving out $30 billion in new bonuses – the illusion that corporate honchos give a flying damn about average Americans is fading faster than a Wal-Mart shirt.
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