I’m from a small town outside of Houston, Texas called Wallis. To my New Yorker friends, Wallis may appear “rural,” but, with a trip downtown clocking in at 35 minutes on sprawling Texas tollways, it’s not exactly that far from essential medication, not to mention some of the nation’s best hospitals. Despite slipping in some not-so-sneaky boasting, I’m concerned about the millions of Americans who live in rural areas who cannot access the prescription medications they need.
For years, rural residents in the U.S. have faced even greater obstacles to health care than their urban friends, and that includes problems accessing affordable prescription drugs. The rapid introduction of new medications by pharmaceutical companies, the growth of third-party payments and large volume suppliers have helped create a marketplace that negatively impacts the bottom lines of low-volume, rural independent pharmacies. Due to geographical limits on access (and also—let’s face it—pharmaceutical companies taking advantage of demand and lack of manpower to fight back), pharmacies and small hospitals across the country pay thousands more on much-needed medication than urban areas.
Rural pharmacies closures, which are due to their low sales volumes of medications, often leave such communities many miles from the next pharmacy. This, in turn, forces an unfair burden upon rural residents. In the age of the Internet, one can’t help but wonder why this is still a problem.
PharmacyChecker-verified international online pharmacies can be a lifeline to rural communities, especially for the uninsured and under-insured who pay for medications out of pocket. Using PharmacyChecker, people can compare medication prices among credentialed online pharmacies at a savings of up to 97% off the average U.S. retail price.
It’s crucial to educate urban and rural citizens alike on the safety practices of verified online pharmacies, to let them know that they have an affordable alternative.
