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reasonsforhope · 24 days

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Less than three months after U.S. Senator Tammy Baldwin and her colleagues launched an investigation into the four major American manufacturers of inhalers, three of the companies have relented, making commitments to cap costs for their inhalers at $35 for patients who now pay much more.

25 million Americans have asthma and 16 million Americans have chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), meaning over 40 million Americans rely on inhalers to breathe.

Inhalers have been available since the 1950s, and most of the drugs they use have been on the market for more than 25 years.

According to a statement from the Wisconsin Senator’s office, inhaler manufacturers sell the exact same products at a much lower costs in other countries. One of AstraZeneca’s inhalers, Breztri Aerosphere, costs $645 in the U.S.—but just $49 in the UK. Inhalers made by Boehringer Ingelheim, GlaxoSmithKline, and Teva have similar disparities.

Baldwin and her Democratic colleagues—New Mexico Sen. Ben Ray Luján, Massachusetts Sen. Ed Markey, and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders—pressured the companies to lower their prices by writing letters to GSK, Boehringer Ingelheim, Teva, and AstraZeneca requesting a variety of documents that show why such higher prices are charged in America compared to Europe.

As a ranking member of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, Baldwin recently announced that as a result of the letters they had secured commitments from three of the four to lower the out-of-pocket costs of inhalers to a fixed $35.00 rate.

“For the millions of Americans who rely on inhalers to breathe, this news is a major step in the right direction as we work to lower costs and hold big drug companies accountable,” said Senator Baldwin.

A full list of the inhalers and associated drugs can be viewed here.

It’s the second time in the last year that pharmaceutical companies were forced to provide reasonable prices—after the cost of insulin was similarly capped successfully at $35 per month thanks to Congressional actions led by the White House.

-via Good News Network, March 25, 2024

#united states #us politics #us senate #tammy baldwin #bernie sanders #big pharma #health care #us healthcare #inhaler #asthma #pulmonary disease #healthcare access #affordability #disability #good news #hope

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xiaq · 10 months

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I don't know if anyone else in Texas/the US is dealing with this right now, but just a PSA: over the last year my primary doctor and my dermatologist both suddenly had a "suggested pharmacy" that would "conveniently deliver your medication for free" rather than just sending it to whatever pharmacy location was closest to me. I was like, sure? Sounds great?

I don't have regular prescriptions, but I noticed that the occasional prescriptions I needed for eczema flare-ups or when I had the flu, seemed like they cost more than they should.

My dermatologist prescribed me Tretinoin last week, which I've never used before. From research online, it looked like it should cost less than $20 with my insurance. When it came time to virtually "check out" for the suggested pharmacy, they wanted me to pay $55. I called my derm and was like, can I opt out of this suggested pharmacy and just get my script sent to the place by my house? And they pushed back a bit (supposedly, their prices were competitive and should be similar to those at any other pharmacy. Sure, Jan.) but eventually did transfer it. Turns out, Tretinoin is $10 at my normal pharmacy. So, I don't know exactly what this bullshit is but watch out for it if your doc suddenly starts suggesting a handy dandy pharmacy with "free" delivery.

#american healthcare #us healthcare #psa #pharmacy nonsense #mylife

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dontmean2bepoliticalbut · 15 days

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HOW CHRISTIANITY SUPPORTS MULTIRACIAL, MULTICULTURAL DEMOCRACY

'The Bible doesn't mention abortion or gay marriage, but it goes on and on about forgiving debt, liberating the poor, and healing the sick' — This pastor perfectly explained how the values expressed in Christianity can support a multiracial, multicultural democracy instead of right-wing extremism (via jamestalarico on TikTok)

#christianity #religion #democracy

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eggsaladstain · 2 years

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ah, the US healthcare system

Source: Tuca & Bertie, Season 3, Episode 2

#tuca and bertie #tuca toucan #tuca #tiffany haddish #adult swim #cartoon network #us healthcare #animation #tuca & bertie

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dontmeantobepoliticalbut · 2 years

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Transcript Below:

John Stewart: "Why would the state of Arkansas step in to override parents, physicians, psychiatrists, endocrinologists who have developed guidelines? Why would you override those guidelines?"

Arkansas AG Leslie Rutledge: "Well, I think it's important that [of] all of those physicians, all of those experts, for every single one of them, there's an expert that says we DON'T need to allow children to be able to take those medications. That there are many instances where—"

JS: "Right, but you know THAT'S not true. You know it's not 'For every one there's one.' There's 'These are the established medical—’”

LR: "Well, I don't know that that's not true. I don't know that YOU know that—"

JS: "Then why did you pass a law, then, if you don't? If you don't know that it's true, wouldn't you have done some—"

LR: "Well, I know that there are doctors and that we had plenty of people come and testify before our legislature who said that, uh, you know, we have 98% of the young people who have gender dysphoria, uh, that they are able to move past that and once they had the help they need, no longer suffer from gender dysphoria. 98% without, uh, that medical treatment that—"

JS: "Mhmm. Right. Wow! That's uh, that's an incredibly made-up figure. That—that doesn't comport with ANY of the studies or documentation that exists from these medical organizations. What—what medical association are you talking about of these doctors?"

LR: "Well, we have all of that in our, uh, legislative history and we'll be glad to provide that to you. Uh, I don't have the name of that off the top of my head. I know it's something that—"

JS: "You don't have the name of the organization that—?"

LR: "Off the top of my head.”

JS: "Oh, ok."

LR: "Yes. But we have all of that cited in all of our briefs."

JS: "You're suggesting that protecting children means overriding the recommendations of the American Medical Association, the American Association of Pediatrics, the Endocrine Society..."

LR: "We don't have enough data. We don't have enough to show that these drugs ARE effective and that these children ARE better off and that we should encourage these—"

JS: "'We don't have enough' or there's not enough for YOU? But, let me try and flip it a different way and see if maybe this can help... In Arkansas, if you have pediatric cancer, and obviously we all wanna protect children, I think we established that earlier, whose guidelines do you follow, for pediatric cancer?"

LR: "Well, I think if my child, who's 4, if I was faced with that terrible, uh, decision, then I would be speaking to my doctor. And if my doctor recommended something that I'd disagreed with, then I would get a second opinion and that's what I believe, that these parents need to make sure that they're encouraged to get numerous opinions when they're talking about an irreversible step in their childs—"

JS: "You're not letting them. The state's not saying 'Get another opinion,' what they're saying is, 'YOU CAN'T.' What you're actually saying is the opposite."

LR: "No, that's actually not at all what the state said. The state simply said that you cannot perform these procedures and so parents SHOULD get another opinion that they—and children SHOULD want to have another opinion, because again these are 9, 10, 11, 12 year olds."

JS: "But that's not—So, if your child is suffering from pediatric cancer and the state comes in and says to you, 'They recommend chemotherapy but we're not going to let you do that. You can't. We think you should get a different opinion and here's the organization we think you should get the opinion from. They're not the mainstream, but they're AN organization, so that's how you— that's who you have to be treated by.' Does that sound like something that you would accept?"

LR: "Well, I think that's a very extreme example. That's not at all in line with what we're talking about. We're not saying that at some point, because when you have cancer it literally is—uh, particularly pediatric cancer—and having friends that have lost children to pediatric cancer—"

JS: "Sure."

LR: "Having a 4 year old, I'm sure—"

JS: "I've got some bad news for you. Parents with children who have gender dysphoria have lost children to suicide and depression because it's acute."

LR: "They absolutely have."

JS: "And so these mainstream medical organizations have developed guidelines through peer-reviewed data and studies, and through those guidelines they've improved mental health outcomes. So, I'm confused why you follow AMA guidelines and AAP guidelines for all other health issues in Arkansas, because we checked, but not for this."

LR: "It's simply saying let those young people who are facing gender confusion and dysphoria, allow them to become adults and to make that decision. Allow a child to be a child."

JS: "So, here's where we have our—our crossroads. You've made the determination that protecting these children means not giving them access to the guidelines and care that have been designed by medical and mental health professionals for children expressing gender dysphoria and I'm asking you, again, what are your qualifications to step in and say, 'No, keeping you from that care is protecting you.' You've made that determination."

LR: "Well, these are irreversible decisions that these children at these young ages are making or that their parents are making—"

JS: "They're not making the decision. You're making it sound like a 9 year old walks into a doctor's office and says, 'Give me some testosterone.' And the doctor goes, 'Oh thank God, because we're wanting to create an army of transgenders, because we're crazy!' And they go right in, like—"

LR: "No. We passed a law to protect the children in Arkansas and I think that's what is important."

JS: "Again. The medical community disagrees with you that that's protecting children."

LR: "Well not ALL of the medical community..."

JS: "Who doesn't? Who—?"

LR: "We have had experts testify here in Arkansas."

JS: "Ok, from what medical organizations?"

LR: "Well, we have all of those in our briefs and I apologize that I wasn't prepared to have a Supreme Court argument today in front of you, but I—we are going to have arguments on this case—"

JS: "Right..."

LR: "—when the time comes."

Watch the episode, including the full interview, for free here:

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singsongraptor · 8 months

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Can someone please help me out with feeding my kids tonight? This last two weeks has been a hot mess for my family as we experience the "joys" of US healthcare and its absolute hatred for elders in general, but especially Black elders.

This all started with my grandmom needing an arterial bypass to save her foot. She got an infection in the rehab center. Cleared it up, sent home. Needed surgery on the other leg, last month and that's where it really dovetailed.

She got another infection, & this one was big. She was in the hospital for a month, needed 3 surgeries to clean the wound and came home needing both oral antibiotics and IV antibiotics. I had to learn how to give her infusions, change her bandages and she's got a wound vac.

The home care company has been a menace the last two weeks. They lied about her medicare insurance stopping payment on her services, lied to her doctor about it, which led him to write orders to drop the wound vac, which they used to try and take her vac and discharge her.

Meanwhile, my sis and I are handling all the practical care, keeping our parents abreast of her health while they handle the clerical side, as well as get our kids prepared for the school year starting, and they all have uniforms, which ate what little spare funds we had

tldr, our circumstances have been extremely high stress and miserable, I'm exhausted and in more pain, I'm worried about my grandmother, and I still have to feed this household for Sept with 8 dollars to my name, get shoes and masks for the kids

And ya know, med care for myself would be nice too, though what I'd really like is another air purifier. Food and masks for the kids come first tho, so please, any and all survival appreciation for this capitalist, racist hellscape is love

Also, we need sick people stuff, like soup and otc meds like ibuprofen and cold medicine.

#antiblackness #disability #us healthcare #us health system

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starry-genome · 7 months

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If you have ever wondered why health insurance in the US is so messed up, I highly recommend checking out Dr. Glaucomflecken’s 30 days of Healthcare series. Click here for the YouTube playlist or click here for the TikTok playlist.

Each video is about 1-3 minutes and goes through different aspects of the healthcare industry explaining how it works and especially how corrupt it is.

I spent 5 years working hospital finance watching the way health insurance directly affected my patients, and oftentimes seeing the ways lack of access to affordable healthcare resulted in chronic and emergent conditions, and even death. I cannot stress enough that I literally saw people die because their insurance denied them treatment. And on the billing side, the things people would complain about to me as something the doctors or hospital were doing wrong were usually a direct result of the way health insurance runs everything. It’s disgusting.

At the end of the series, he has a call to action - ways we (as regular people) can help work to improve healthcare (other than pushing for universal healthcare/Medicare for all). A lot of people talk about how ridiculous US Healthcare is but rarely do I see anyone talking about what we can do to change it. I think this is the most important video of all, so I’m including it here.

This video series is probably the most comprehensive, easiest to understand breakdown of the way healthcare fucks everyone over - patients, doctors, and hospitals alike. Please check it out!

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destielmemenews · 7 months

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"Picketers across California, Colorado, Oregon and Washington who are represented by a coalition of unions walked off the job Wednesday. They are seeking higher wages and solutions to a short-staffing crisis, exacerbated by the pandemic, that has left workers feeling overburdened and run down."

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#destiel meme #destiel meme news #united states #us news #news #nurses strike #healthcare #us health system #healthcare strike #kaiser permanente #us healthcare #nurses #workers strike #striking

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turtlesandfrogs · 2 years

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Uh, just saw this:

The website is costplusdrugs.com I just checked and they don't carry Adderall or insulin, but they do have a lot.

#mutual aid #us health system #us healthcare #medicine

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kim-practical · 2 months

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#humor #super bowl #travis kelce #dank memes #funny memes #lol memes #us healthcare #healthcare #fresh memes #super bowl 2024 #meme #memesdaily #nfl football

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thypandatetor · 2 years

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Hey, Americans, open enrollment is sooooooonnn. And the US health care system is a mess, but Brian David Gilbert made this great video about how to navigate it.

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I use to work in health insurance as customer service, worked there for a little over 2 years and was very good at it, but the ✨anxiety✨ got to me... BUT ANYWAYS, BDG is totally right on all of this and also fun to watch

#health insurance #open enrollment #brian david gilbert #us health insurance #us health system #us healthcare

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reasonsforhope · 1 year

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"Sanofi on Thursday said it’s planning to cut the U.S. price of its most popular insulin drug by 78% and cap monthly out-of-pocket costs at $35 for people who have private insurance starting next year.

In addition to its widely prescribed Lantus, the French drugmaker will reduce the list price of its short-acting insulin Apidra by 70%. Sanofi already offers a $35 monthly cap on insulin for uninsured diabetes patients.

The company is the last major insulin manufacturer to try to head off government efforts to cap monthly costs by announcing its own steep price cuts for the lifesaving hormone.

Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk made similar sweeping cuts earlier this month after years of political pressure and public outrage over the high costs of diabetes care. The three companies control over 90% of the global insulin market.

... The change takes effect Jan. 1.

President Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act capped monthly insulin costs for Medicare beneficiaries at $35, but it did not provide protection to diabetes patients who are covered by private insurance.

Sen. Bernie Sanders, a Vermont independent and the chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, introduced a bill earlier this month that would cap the list price of insulin at $20 per vial.

Both the president and Sanders on Tuesday directly called on Sanofi to slash its prices after Novo Nordisk announced its own cuts that day.

Roughly 37 million people in the U.S., or 11.3% of the country’s population, have diabetes, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Approximately 8.4 million [U.S.] diabetes patients rely on insulin, the American Diabetes Association said."

-via CNBC, 3/16/23

#insulin #big pharma #diabetes #health care #eli lilly and co #us healthcare #healthcare access #prescription drugs #biden #bernie sanders #health insurance #united states #us politics #good news #hope #it should start IMMEDIATELY and I hope their efforts to avoid gov price caps FAIL WITH EXTREME PREJUDICE #but the important thing is access to affordable insulin #so i'll take the progress #affordable healthcare

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anarchywoofwoof · 3 months

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I’m a nurse and I had a seizure at my old job (when they hired me they knew I had a disability), they asked me to continue working after the seizure and when I did not I got wrote up for leaving early. I was bleeding from a bloody nose, I had vomited during the seizure. I saw the bereavement post you reblogged and wanted to add that hospitals are corporations and they do not care about us. We’re just bodies to them.

this is revolting but unsurprising. thanks for sharing, but i’m sorry youve had to deal with this.

one of the details that is often overlooked or missed about a capitalist society is the inherent capitalization of health care.

in a capitalist healthcare system, the focus often shifts to maximizing profits, which can negatively impact patient care. healthcare becomes less of an emphasis and more about making money than ensuring patient well-being. health insurance, which is obviously integral in accessing care, becomes more about financial gain, reducing coverage and affordability. doctors and nurses face increased pressure to control costs and less so to provide quality care.

these aspects contribute to a system where patient health isn't seen as the priority. boardrooms full of assholes with MBAs end up making the decisions over the actual medical staff responsible for the maintenance of societal health. how could we ever expect to treat people fairly and equitably if the decisions are always based in dollars and cents?

#borking back #us healthcare #american healthcare #fuck capitalism #anti capitalism #anti capitalist

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dontmean2bepoliticalbut · 1 year

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#us politics #2022 #republicans #conservatives #gop #gop platform #gop policy #us healthcare #medicare #medicaid #social security #social security administration #entitlements #entitlement programs

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alanaisalive · 9 months

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"We can't do medicare for all! That would put the health insurance companies out of business!"

Okay, then require gun owners to buy liability insurance, and help the health insurance companies pivot to providing gun insurance. It'd be a 2 for 1 deal on improving things slightly.

#medicare for all #us healthcare #gun control #please leave more idiotic right wing rants #my block list is lonely

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historyforfuture · 5 months

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Kids of Palestine who martyred through the israeli occupation genocides against families in gaza .

Don,t watch if u can,t .

أطفال شهداء ارتقوا في مجازر الاحتلال التي ارتكبها بحق العائلات في شمال قطاع غزة.

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