[HN Gopher] FTC Accuses Drug Middlemen of Inflating Insulin Prices
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FTC Accuses Drug Middlemen of Inflating Insulin Prices
Author : OutOfHere
Score : 30 points
Date : 2024-09-20 17:39 UTC (5 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.nytimes.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.nytimes.com)
| OutOfHere wrote:
| https://archive.is/U8GDM
|
| It has now come to the FTC to protect us because the FDA has been
| strongly aligned with big money. If Trump comes to power,
| however, the FTC would be on the chopping block.
| jachriga wrote:
| PBMs finally being on the chopping block is 20+ years overdue,
| and the American public have consistently refused to accept
| that drug manufacturers aren't solely responsible for high drug
| prices. Having worked with the JDRF in the past, it's never
| been a secret that while the list price of insulin has been
| going up...the net revenue per unit has actually gone down
| (albeit only slightly). Total profit has been scaling upwards
| because of a massive push of type 2 patients towards insulin,
| increasing sales volume.
|
| Knowingly pushing type 2 patients towards insulin when cheaper,
| better options for them might exist can 100% be blamed on the
| manufacturers; however, the oft-maligned list price increases
| have a lot to do with the mostly-secret negotiations between
| manufacturers, PBMs, and health plans (many of which share
| ownership with the PBMs). A big effect of those negotiations
| helps to artificially increase the amount of dollars spent on
| drugs (on paper) while also artificially decreasing the actual
| dollars spent, making it easier for health plans to hit the ACA
| 80/20 rule with elevated premiums.
|
| All of this to say...none of these price negotiations or
| middlemen entities (I'm counting health plans as middlemen
| between patients and their drugs...) _should_ be targeted by
| the FDA, as that 's not their responsibility. The FDA should be
| focused on the clinical side only as much as possible. Much to
| my chagrin, some amount of credit for PBMs and drug rebates
| being part of the modern conversation goes to the Trump
| administration.
| howard941 wrote:
| They may be hitting the 80/20 rule W/R/T PPACA premiums but
| the out of pocket for almost everything not negotiated by the
| executive branch is out of this world. Common generics have
| become crazy expensive. Don't even go to the on-patent meds:
| They're unaffordable for all but large employer plans and the
| policies covering Federal employees.
| htek wrote:
| Isn't it a moot point anyway? The corrupt SCOTUS tossed out the
| Chevron doctrine, putting into question the "constitutionality"
| of administrative enforcement of Executive Branch agency rules
| and enforcement of federal law.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2024/09/...
| hirvi74 wrote:
| What does the FTC expect in for-profit healthcare system?
| janalsncm wrote:
| It's a bad sign for a market when certain players' profits are
| growing unconstrained. It suggests something is very wrong with a
| market. I believe the government's role is _at a minimum_ to
| correct for market failures and inefficiencies.
|
| Intuitively, a healthy market should prevent this kind of price
| gouging because there's a strong incentive for new players to
| undercut incumbents. I can't charge too much for gas because the
| station across the street will undercut me. If _prices_ are
| growing that isn't necessarily a bad sign. But we have seen
| several areas, like rent prices, eggs, meat, and oil, where
| profits grew unconstrained. And that's a strong indicator that
| something is wrong.
|
| Lena Khan is very sharp and seems to be cracking down on this
| kind of thing. I just hope she is able to continue.
| JohnMakin wrote:
| > I believe the government's role is at a minimum to correct
| for market failures and inefficiencies.
|
| Much, maybe even half of the country does not believe this
| though. Until that changes nothing will.
|
| late edit: I personally believe this, but I've lost faith in
| this government's ability to do this role without extreme
| corruption, so meh. No idea what to do really.
| dimal wrote:
| The medical industry, when presented with a chronic illness,
| instead of trying to cure it, sees it as a source of recurring
| revenue. And then that's not even good enough. The consumers are
| captive, so they find a way to gouge them.
|
| I wish people would stop calling what we have a healthcare
| system. We have a medical industry, which seeks to provide a
| minimum of medical services for maximum profit. The system is
| working exactly as designed.
| theGnuMe wrote:
| This is patently untrue.
| keyboardcaper wrote:
| Explain how we keep treating essential tremor as a disease of
| the elderly to be managed with CNS depressant drugs, when we
| have known for decades the disease is entirely caused by a
| single substance (harmane) which can be mostly avoided by
| stopping coffee, tobacco and meat consumption?
|
| There are plenty of other examples.
| PoignardAzur wrote:
| > _which can be mostly avoided by stopping coffee, tobacco
| and meat consumption?_
|
| Wait, so you're implying the medical industry is
| responsible for people eating meat and drinking coffee?
| Suppafly wrote:
| That's literally what middlemen do, they wouldn't exist if they
| couldn't extract value from the items they pass along.
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