Now why would anyone think such a thing considering all the sterling and selfless characters with their fingers in US health and welfare issues? ...

* Second, some people believe that the vaccine is not safe, that corners have been cut in its production, and that it is a new, experimental vaccine. "In fact, none of that is the case," he said. "It is made the same way the flu vaccine is made each year, in the same facilities and by the same companies." And that seasonal vaccine, he added, has "been used safely in hundreds of millions of people. My children will get it [the swine flu vaccine], other public health and societal leaders will get it and have their families get it."

How do you talk to these people? The insurance company mentality ...

My eye doctor (ophthalmologist if you prefer) increased an eyedrop prescription from a drop in each eye twice a day to three times a day.

Walgreens gives me a 10ml bottle and charges the rate for a 30 day supply. At the window I ask whether 10ml will last 30 days. The pharmacist says it 'should.'

I used google and found that 10 ml of a thick solution (which this is) would provide around 120 drops. I need 180 drops for 30 days (what we're supposed for those months that have 31 days I have no idea). I called Walgreens and was told over the phone after she 'checked the computer' that the supply was for 25 days though they were happy to charge the full monthly co-pay.

At this point Walgreens is saying that they will order a 15ml bottle (with a sigh evidently because 'they don't usually carry that size'). I haven't opened the box the prescription came in so I'm taking it back and supposedly I'm going to get a 15ml bottle in it's place (don't hold your breath).

To the pharmacist at Walgreens I said I was concerned that they would give me a 25 day supply, charge me the rate for a months supply and never say a word about it. What were they going to do when I came back early to refill the prescription? The answer is they cannot fill the request with part of a bottle. Well I know that. As if I would accept an opened bottle. Good grief. What about prorating the charge. That concept, evidently, is taboo.

[Note: I like the pharmacist herself. I assume she's just caught up in the system and has to work within the environment. Pharmacists are dependent on their corporate bosses and the insurance companies. They are not accountable to us the customers. There must be a great deal of strain in the job as they have to deal directly with us, the customer, while following the money grubbing directives of the corporate mafia.]

I called AARP, who sells this insurance coverage. I explained what had happened at Walgreens and explained that I was told that Walgreens would supply a 15ml bottle and that I was calling to express a concern about how the program was administered. I was concerned that Walgreens filled my prescription with a quantity (est 25 days worth) that they knew would not last for the month and that when I mentioned that they didn't really seem concerned. The first response from the AARP rep was 'yes?' as if that sounds right to me. There's no point to trying to recall the rest of the conversation. It's like talking to a wall. I don't think they even understand the concept of fairness. If they offer a policy with a $30.00 co-pay for 30 day supply then for $30.00 one should receive a 30 day supply. If because of the arbitrary size of certain medications that is not possible then prorate the co-pay. This is absolutely incomprehensible to them. Does not compute, period. Anyway the conversation ended with her putting me on hold to check on something. I was on hold for what seemed like quite a while. When she came back on the line she apologized for leaving me on hold so long and said she was going to transfer me to an 'expert' (I think she said expert) in 'this.' Well then I went on what seemed like permanent hold. I hung up after what seemed like a long time (I didn't time it).

Voilà, problem solved, from their perspective at least.

This is how sick Americans get help? ...

A bus rolls into town (Partnership for Prescription Assistance, sponsored by the pharmaceutical industry). The sick must go to downtown (not a good place to park for those with vehicles, but not bad for buses depending on how far away the sick person in need of meds lives). They must be there between 11:30 a.m.-1 p.m. They must know they names of the medicines they need and their insurance status (oh, my).

Staffers use computers to quickly sift through 475 patient-assistance programs to find possible matches for patients, who answer about a dozen questions, including age and income.

What these people get is a match up of 'eligibility criteria.' Hallelujah!

Next they actually have to see if the wonderfully bloated pharmaceutical industry will give them some charity.

This is how we take care of the sick and needy, when we feel like it, in the country with the 'best medical care in the world.'

Last week I got an itching rash on face and neck. I got into the doctor the day I called (only because I've recently changed doctors because it was impossible to ever see my former choice of doctors and then when one did get an appoint one still hardly saw her except in passing). The itching was 'driving me crazy.' I can just see myself going downtown on a bus (I wouldn't have been able to manage parking, etc while climbing the proverbial wall) to get a match up for medications. If I hadn't had health insurance I would have been in the emergency ward, it was that bad.

Sorry if I can't get that excited at this latest example of corporate largess. What a waste we make of our resources. [But it's nice that the people driving the bus and managing the operation have jobs.]

A frustrated pharmacist ...

So why did they cancel her AARP Medicare Prescription Plan retroactively? And why is the cancellation date so fluid?

I am a pharmacist and if anyone ever tells you that market forces are the solution to our health care mess --- please give them a fat lip for me, because it is crap.

I have a customer... we will call her Jane Doe. She used to be on Minnesota Medical Assistance but when our "President" came up with that "wonderful" Medicare Part D pile of bull, this woman's prescription program was shifted to that program. She didn't have a choice about switching to Medicare Part D, but she did have a few choices of carriers within the system.

She decided to use a program sponsored by AARP. Seemed like a good idea....AARP works with seniors all the time. However, AARP does not administer the program. No, they farm that out to a Pharmacy Benefit Manager... in this case it was RX Solutions.

...

Will we every hear the end of the story?

Big Oil, Big Military Contractors, Big Pharma -- which is worse?

The answer, of course, is that they are all, in Bush-speak, evil.

But which is worse, at any point in time, depends on our point of view and their immediate and long term effects on us.

Big Pharma effects many of us daily. They strongly influence, or even outright control, what our physicians prescribe. Perhaps many, hopefully most, of our physicians still see that their main responsibilities should lie with the patient, but more and more the big pockets of Big Pharma is subverting our health care (just as those same big pockets subvert our Congress).

This article (How Big Pharma Learned To Seduce You by Alicia Rebensdorf) reviews the lack of any substantive change in proposed legislation:

At first glance, drug company influence on the recent legislation can be hard to see. The bill raises fees on pharmaceutical patents to beef up FDA staff and speed review. It also gives the FDA power to fine companies for ads that fail to list risks in a "clear and conspicuous neutral manner."

However, compared to the recommendations made by the Institute of Medicine back in September, this bill replaces a steak knife with a spoon. The Senate bill ignores their suggested two-year moratorium on advertising new medication. It fails to require FDA approval before ads go on air and allows the FDA to assess fines only after the fact.

Even then, many critics doubt the fines will be much a deterrent. As Bill Vaughan, a policy analyst at Consumers Union, points out points out, "When a company can make more than a million dollars a day in drug sales, a $150,000 fine for running a misleading advertisement won't have much impact."

In fact, the bill is so soft that even Billy Tauzin, former Republican congressmen and current president of the powerful drug group, Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA), praised the bill, saying it "will no doubt make a good system even better."

Not an unusual occurrence on the web, some commenters flesh out the issues:

Barely touches on the criminality of Big Pharma Posted by: heid on Jun 19, 2007 5:56 AM Current rating: 5

This article barely touches on the harm Big Pharma does or the insidious techniques it uses in promoting its products.

The key is that pharmaceutical firms exist to sell, to make profits. Their purpose is not to make us healthy. We forget that at risk to our health and even our lives.

Drugs have a constellation of effects, and pharmaceutical firms promote only a single one among many, ignoring the rest or calling them "side effects". Just take a look at the over the counter cold medications with the "side effect" of sleepiness, which are also sold under different names for precisely that "side effect" of sleepiness as aids for sleep.

Pharmaceuticals do almost no real frontline research. Most of the money for that comes from you and me - the taxpayers. Most research done by pharmaceuticals is on slight moderations of existing drugs to allow their repatenting, or for finding different uses for existing drugs. Worse, most of it is done for so-called ailments that never existed until Big Pharma "discovered" and promoted them, or for relatively mild but common conditions. In other words, what little research they do is focused on the bottom line - not on helping really sick people get better.

Big Pharma does its own testing, an obvious conflict of interest, and frequently hides its negative results, redoing and refining trials until they get the results they want. Then, the drugs are approved by the FDA, which is now beholden primarily to Big Pharma, and they are released on an unsuspecting public, and those who are unfortunate enough to be prescribed these drugs become the real guinea pigs.

Big Pharma has extended its influence into the medical world itself by outright bribing doctors, giving them gifts, providing nearly all the Continuing Education seminars doctors go to, and using the cheapest and tackiest of sales methods - such as using former cheerleaders as their primary sales people - imaginable.

In the patient support arena, Big Pharma has managed to distort even these groups by providing funding to them and often even creating them.

None of this even touches on some of the worst abuses, but does cover a fair amount of the techniques used by Big Pharma.

Now, we have a new bill that not only allows all this to continue, but makes it worse. It will now be possible for the FDA itself to start making and selling drugs. Even more money will be given to the FDA by pharmaceutical firms - and there can be little doubt that following the money shows what's really going on, so this addition of funds from Big Pharma to the FDA simply places the FDA even deeper into the pharmaceutical pockets.

RE: Barely touches on the criminality of Big Pharma Posted by: mirimac on Jun 19, 2007 2:01 PM Current rating: 4

There's also the scandal of Big Pharma being in cahoots with Medicare and the Insurance Cos. that manage Medicare.

As someone who relies on a number of drugs to keep me functioning, I honestly feel like a prisoner to the system, between needing to take these drugs (some of which have not gone generic yet) and being in the Medicare Part D w/ managing insurance company charging whatever suits them to charge me for the same drugs. My monthly drug bill runs around $500. Last fall I purchased my meds on Sept. 1 (by purchase I mean the copays, deductibles, etc.) On Sept. 15, the cost of two of my most expensive meds was increased quite a bit. That cost was passed on to me even though I'd already "paid" for them.

Then there was the drug that my doctor prescribed, that Medicare/Insurance wouldn't cover. The drug they recommended, which my doc then reluctantly prescribed nearly killed me.

My son worked hard to earn a PharmD degree and get a job working for one of the Big Pharma COs. His job was to track negative side-effects and report them in such a way as to lessen their negativity as much as possible. He didn't last a year. His conscience kept him thinking of all those who'd died due to various meds and whose lives were being negated by the company through him.

It used to be big oil that was in charge. Now I'm sure its big Pharma. Between the two, we don't stand a chance

Our new 'democratic' Congress is quickly teaching us to expect little more from them than from the earlier Republican Robber Baron Congress. Having Democrats merely slow the progress of the cancer is not a very cheery prospect. I, for one, want to see them cut the cancer out. But that would be too much risk to our elected representatives. After all, we're not the only ones paying them.

The market place saves money farce ...

If we believed Republicans, the GOP and/or Conservatives (which I did once-upon-a-time) then business can always perform more efficiently than the government.

Well, not exactly. It appears that big business cannot even operate without handouts from the government to ensure their obscene profits. The government still subsidizes Medicare private insurance plans:

... study after study, by MedPAC, the Congressional Budget Office, the Commonwealth Fund, and numerous scholars, show that taxpayers are paying at least 12% more to private plans than would be paid for the same beneficiaries in traditional Medicare. The Congressional Budget Offices estimates that these subsidies will cost taxpayers $54 billion over the next five years and $149 billion dollars over the next ten years. As former Medicare Administrator Bruce Vladeck has said, the experiment with privatizing Medicare has not saved Medicare a nickel. [Give The Real Medicare Program A Chance, USA]

Get that? I'll repeat it: " ... the experiment with privatizing Medicare has not saved Medicare a nickel."

But then the Republican goal was not to save Medicare any money. The goal was to destroy Medicare.

The Medicare Part D drug plan was also set up with subsidies to ensure even more profit for the pharmaceutical and insurance industries. In addition the government by law cannot negotiate drug prices for medicare. So those who financially support our government (that us, the rich don't pay anymore) are paying twice, at least. First we pay the insurance companies extra in order to guarantee they will make obscene profits. Then we pay (directly or through an insurance provider) whatever the drug companies decide they want to extract out of the American consumer for their obscene profits. Oh, and if you are on Medicare Part D there is always the potential that you will be fleeced a third time with the bait-and-switch program built into the legislation. Legislation written by the pharmaceutical industry and probably not even read by your Congress Critter.

The article quoted above has this to say about AARP's entrance into the Medicare Advantage Insurance market:

Unfortunately, AARP's entrance into the private Medicare market provides a major boost to the privatization of Medicare. It also significantly reduces the organization's ability to speak as an objective voice for the interests of Medicare beneficiaries and the future of Medicare. The Center for Medicare Advocacy's mission is to advance fair access to Medicare and health care. Private Medicare is not best for beneficiaries and it's more expensive for taxpayers. Based on these standards and the history of Medicare, we can not support the privatization of Medicare, and we regret AARP's decision to do so.

I agree. Democrats had better start working on universal health care coverage. Letting the insurance companies chip away at this is disastrous. It can only get worse when greed is the sole motivation of these entities.

They give us proof, almost daily ...

GOP Senators have shown once again that Republicans love their corporate masters and hate the rest of us:

Effort to let government negotiate Medicare drug prices falters in Senate

Meet Weird Wally ...

... who has as little faith in AARP as have I.

Weird Wally Gets Even Weirder

About the Big Pharma Mafia ...

60 minutes documents the passing of the Medicare Part D (the prescription drug plan) legislation and the subsequent exodus of individuals, who helped the pharmaceutical industry get what they wanted, to highly paid positions with the industry or their enablers.

Watch the video clip at Crooks and Liars:

Under the Influence: How Lobbyists Wrote and Bought the Rx Drug Bill

Though initially AARP came out against this bill AARP's Republican CEO Bill Novelli made a last minute switch in favor of the bill and even advertised for its passage.

Personal disclaimer: When AARP made that switch to the dark side I cancelled my membership. I still am not a member but when I began looking into prescription drug plans AARP's was definitely the best (from my perspective). Best does not necessarily mean good. Many plans I looked at would not have saved money, in fact with their trick of only covering certain drugs and not others it can actually cost more. Though AARP's plan seems good at present it still has the ability of becoming a bait and switch, a capability that was written into the Pharma Mafia legislation.

Tucson's University Medical Center and drug money ...

The drug mafia (or Big Pharma, the pharmaceutical industry, whatever you wish to call them) buy the medical profession much the same way they buy elected and appointed government officials.

The Arizona Daily Star reports that:

A new policy has been drafted that would stop the free meals, gifts, trips and payments at the University of Arizona College of Medicine.

The title of the article may be misleading. It implies that this change is a done deal. But within the article one gets the impression that UA doctors may fight an effort that requires that they give up their free lunch, literally. According to the article the revised policy will be presented to the UA medical faculty. Now we'll see if the University of Arizona chooses integrity over money. What's your guess?

A few stats that should raise your blood pressure:

Pharmaceutical companies spend up to $18 billion a year — more than $13,000 per doctor — persuading doctors to prescribe their drugs, with overwhelming emphasis on the newest and costliest. This pays for some 60 million visits a year by salespeople — known as "drug reps" — laden with all manner of food, gifts, sponsorships and other tokens.

They do it because it works. Study after study shows that while doctors deny any influence from all the wooing, it does significantly increase the likelihood that they'll prescribe the drugs being pushed, even if evidence shows they may not be the best or most cost-effective.

-------------------------
Arizona Daily Star: UMC to loosen drug reps' grip --New policy would ban doctors' perks that cost patients by Carla McClain

Big Pharma preys on seniors ...

Reuters reports that prices for medications commonly used by the elderly have increased close to double the rate of inflation. Since in the US these drugs are overpriced to begin with what we are witnessing with these increases is an even more massive transfer of money directly into the bulging veins to Big Pharma.

"CHICAGO, March 6 (Reuters) - Prices for about 200 prescription drugs in the United States commonly used by seniors rose nearly twice the rate of inflation, a seniors group said on Tuesday, making a case for letting the government negotiate drug prices.

Insomnia pill Ambien, made by Sanofi-Aventis ..., topped the list of steepest price increases, with a 30 percent rise in price in 2006, the report by the seniors' lobby AARP, formerly known as the American Association of Retired Persons, said." (continue reading Brand name drug prices soar for US seniors -- AARP)

The article ends with Big Pharma implying that the US pays high prices because many other countries pay less (those being the countries with enough intelligence to negotiate group discounts --you know that standard business practice that we can't seem to get the hang of here in Bush's America). Oh, and there's that huge research and development investment Big Pharma pretends they pay. No mention of the amount of our money that they put into advertising and subverting the medical profession to hand out their newest concoction without thinking.

Nothing new here. Privatization is just the latest in Robber Baron schemes.