Read it and weep
An INQ7.net article on overpriced medicine begins thus:
I go regularly to a Mercury Drug store to buy my maintenance medicines and always there would be a few customers beside me at the crowded counter who would hand the pharmacist a doctor’s prescription and wait apprehensively while the pharmacist adds the total cost of the medicines. Usually, it would be only a week’s supply of medicines or just a few pills. When the pharmacist tells him or her the cost of the medicine, the customer would look at the crumpled bills clutched in his or her hand, think a while and say, “Isa na lang [One only].” Sometimes, the money won’t be enough for even one pill, and the customer would say dejectedly, “Huwag na lang [Never mind],” and slowly walk away.
… And yet, the medicines can be sold for very much less and the company will still have a handsome profit. A survey has shown that prices of medicines here are at least five times more than those sold in other Asian countries. Yes, medicine prices in the Philippines are the highest in the region and in many other parts of the world. And yet, the Philippines is a Third World country where two-thirds of the population live below the poverty level.
I don’t know how accurate the second paragraph of the quote is, since it cites only “a survey” (by whom? conducted when?) and compares the country’s medicine prices with those “in many other parts of the world” (such as?). And yet, more than once I’ve witnessed a scene similar to the one given above. Heck, there were even times when I was in the same sorry predicament.
What exactly are we buying when we purchase branded medicine, anyway? A “trusted” name? It’s not as if the higher price is a solid indicator of effectiveness, quality, or even acceptability to the patient.
A while back, Dana-mee was down with a throat infection, for which the pediatrician prescribed a branded antibiotic from a multinational firm. It cost a whopping 600 bucks a bottle. Also, the Little One hated it because it tasted sooooo bad. (What is is about medicine and ickiness? You’d think that one of those pharmaceutical geniuses could come up with a palatable variant.)
More recently, she suffered from a similar bug which required, you guessed it, an antibiotic. This time, we asked for — and got — a generic equivalent from a company called RiteMed. It cost 90% less than the branded stuff, worked just as well, and was found by our patient to be, if not delicious, a good deal easier to swallow. Bonus points for drinkability.
Wish that were true for every branded drug offered by big-name pharmaceuticals.
Medicine is meant to ease pain, cure sickness, help save lives. It’s a crime to price it so far beyond the reach of those who need it most.
The government’s solution?
…[Former Health Secretary Alberto] Romualdez said free market forces do not work for the pharmaceutical industry because there is no balance between supply and demand. It is the supply side that dictates the prices, he said. That is why prices are artificially high, and the government should step in. It is the duty of the government to do something to help the people, he emphasized.
[Rep. Ferjenel] Biron said the government should establish price controls. He and almost a hundred other congressmen have co-sponsored a bill that would create a Drug Prices Regulation Board that would set maximum retail prices for medicine.
[Senator Alfredo] Lim said he would file a counterpart bill in the Senate.
Isn’t that amazing? Their concern warms the heart, truly it does. But the really amazing thing is that so many ailing Filipinos have had to suffer, maybe even die, before such a duty was “emphasized.”
This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 4, 2005 at 12:11 pm under Local. Both comments and pings are currently closed.