by Gabriel Levitt, President, PharmacyChecker.com and Prescription Justice | Sep 13, 2017 | Drug Prices
At the beginning of this year, Prescription Justice, the non-profit organization I founded, released an analysis showing that about 45 million Americans did not fill a prescription in 2016 due to cost. We derived that figure by looking at 2016 survey data by the Commonwealth Fund, a research organization dedicated to healthcare policy. Its international survey showed that 18% of the adult population in the U.S. did not fill a prescription due to cost. The UK’s rate was nine times lower at 2%.
Last week, I came across new information that showed about six million Americans of Medicare age were included among the 45 million. A new cross-sectional study of Commonwealth Fund international survey data from 2014 shows the percentage of older adults, 55 and up, that do not take medication because of drug prices. People in 11 high-income countries—22,532 overall—were asked if they had gone without prescribed medications in the past year because of cost.
In the U.S., 16.8% of 1593 people said yes.
For those 65 and older the percentage was 12%.
U.S. Census data from July of 2016 shows that there are about 48 million Americans 65 and older.
That means 5.8 million Americans, 65 and older, forgo taking their meds due to cost.
For international comparison: the percentage of older people skipping medications due to prices in the UK was 3.1%. In France, it was only 1.6%.
Sadly, it was quite high in Canada and Australia: 8.3%, and 6.8%, respectively.
The academic, medical term for such medication skipping because of prices is called cost-related nonadherence (CRNA). It’s a serious public health issue, one in which Americans end up getting sicker, going to the emergency room, or dead solely because they can’t pay for medications. As we move into the season when Medicare beneficiaries pick Part D plans, we’ll continue to look at how our oldest citizens are affected by high drug prices. But it’s clear that Medicare pharmacy benefits are falling far short of what is needed. While price should not block ANYONE from essential medications, the fact that so many millions of our oldest citizens who need their prescribed meds the most are forced to go without is disgusting.
Tagged with: Commonwealth Fund, CRNA, older americans
by PharmacyChecker.com | Feb 27, 2015 | Pharmacychecker Online Pharmacy Report
Last week we wrote that we would present a new section of Gabe Levitt’s report on online pharmacies. This week, we are going to start off with the Executive Summary of the report. We’ve given a sample below, but you’ll have to visit PharmacyChecker.com to view the whole Executive Summary.
The U.S. government relies on the Government Accountability Office (GAO) for objective and independent research and analysis of government programs and policies that affect public health. GAO’s report entitled Internet Pharmacies: Federal Agencies and States Face Challenges Combatting Rogue Sites, Particularly Those Abroad (the “GAO report”) contains critical inaccuracies and omits important peer-reviewed research to the extent that lawmakers and their staffs will likely draw erroneous conclusions about international online pharmacies that could lead to overreaching and unnecessary enforcement actions that disadvantage consumers and threaten public health. The GAO report was written pursuant to Section 1127 of the Food and Drug Administration Safety and Innovation Act of 2012 (FDASIA), a law dedicated to protecting public health.
In contrast to the GAO report, the following holistic, consumer-focused, evidence-based analysis discusses online pharmacies within the important context of a health crisis caused by high drug prices in America, and can more appropriately guide lawmakers on how to protect the public from counterfeit or substandard medication. Legitimate public health concerns about rogue online pharmacies are being used to encourage legislative, regulatory, and private sector actions that curtail online access to safe and affordable medication. The consequence of overreach could be millions more Americans facing economic hardship or having to forgo prescribed medication, which studies show can lead to more sickness and death.
Fifty million Americans did not fill a prescription due to cost in 2012, according to the Commonwealth Fund. According to the Harvard School of Public Health, over half of Americans who do not take prescription medication due to cost report becoming sicker.1 That means potentially 25 million Americans become sicker each year because they can’t afford prescribed medication. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), about five million Americans buy prescription drugs from foreign sources each year for reasons of cost. Additional estimates show that between four and five million Americans get their imported prescription drugs through international online pharmacies due to their lower prices.
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Tagged with: CDC, Commonwealth Fund, drug affordability, FDASIA, GAO, government auditing standards, Medication Adherence, Section 1127
by Gabriel Levitt, President, PharmacyChecker.com and Prescription Justice | Jan 30, 2015 | Drug Prices, Healthcare Reform, Medication non-adherence, Skipping medications
This will not be major headline news anytime soon but it’s true. Last week our friends at RxRights blogged about new data from the Commonwealth Fund showing that the number of Americans ages 19-64 who did not fill prescriptions due to cost decreased to a depressing 35 million in 2014 from the even more depressing figure of 50 million in 2012. Obamacare, lower unemployment, and a stronger economy in which people feel more secure paying for even very expensive medications are largely responsible. Minus the very expensive medications – that’s all good stuff.
And how about international online pharmacies and personal drug importation? Well, just yesterday the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported that about 2% of Americans are still buying medication from foreign countries. That’s about 5 million Americans who would potentially go without needed medication if it were not for lower cost foreign medication sold by safe international online pharmacies.
I did not use the word “potentially” loosely. Some of those five million are getting nabbed by rogue online pharmacies, resulting in too many Americans taking substandard, adulterated, or counterfeit medications. If those people are informed properly they will not be victims. PharmacyChecker.com is there for you: if you are one of the 35 million Americans wondering whether you can afford that medication prescribed by your doctor, we’re doing better than ever at empowering you with information that helps you get the medications you need at a price you can afford while steering clear of rogue online pharmacies.
It’s important to remember how dangerous it is to not take the medications you need. One expert at CDC stated: “People who do not take their medication as prescribed have more hospitalizations, emergency room visits and an increased burden of their illness.”
It’s important to note that the CDC report provided lower figures on how many Americans are going without prescribed medications due to cost than the Commonwealth Fund reported: about one in 10. We’re going to look at the data in the coming weeks and provide you some guidance on this discrepancy. But clearly the overall numbers have gotten better in the last two years.
We thrive on these better numbers – more consumers accessing the healthcare they need –but with tens of millions of Americans saying they can’t afford their meds there’s so much more work to be done!
Tagged with: CDC, Commonwealth Fund
At the beginning of this year, Prescription Justice, the non-profit organization I founded, released an analysis showing that about 45 million Americans did not fill a prescription in 2016 due to cost. We derived that figure by looking at 2016 survey data by the Commonwealth Fund, a research organization dedicated to healthcare policy. Its international survey showed that 18% of the adult population in the U.S. did not fill a prescription due to cost. The UK’s rate was nine times lower at 2%.
