If you can believe it, even after a drug goes off patent, drug companies can pay the generic drug manufacturers to hold off making the generic version of the drug. It’s called “pay for delay”? It’s how the drug companies keep drug prices sky high after drugs go off patent. And, according to a report by U.S. PIRG, at least eight of the ten largest drug companies do just that. Pay for delay stifles competition, which brings down drug prices, keeps the price of the drug high and generates big additional profits for the drug companies.
Pay for delay means that consumers pay big time for drugs even when they go off patent. Generic drugs can cost as much as 85 to 90 percent less than the brand-name drug equivalent. So, pay for delay ends up costing us an estimated $3.5 billion in high drug prices according to the FTC.
If you’d like Congress to address this injustice, click here to go to the US PIRG web site.
If drug companies are in the business of healing, why don’t they respect or have compassion for the very people they supposedly are there to help?
They’re not in the business of anything but making maximum profits, that’s why the basic idea that “the market” is best for all things is just a corporate-fascist LIE. There are things that just plain should not be “for-profit” like healthcare, the military, government, etc…
Congress more than likely knows this is going on and could not care less. This is money for everyone, politicians,lobbyist,and drug companies.
With the implementation of the Affordable Care Act there was a noticeable decline in my copay for pharmaceuticals, which now seems to be disappearing. Someone is definitely “Gaming” the system and it`s not the consumer.
The Congress? They’re bought&paid-for. Both so-called “parties” are now one party with different wings, all for the 1%ers and corporates.
Doctors are suppose to be working for patients. It’s their job to help their patient get healthy again not to make a profit from someone else’s suffering.
Really, the truth is, doctors need to be taught and then teaching their patients how to get healthy without the constant use of band-aid pharmaceutical drugs. If that happened, people would be in charge of their own health care with their “trusted” physician’s help and big pharma would not be stroked, as it is now. However, hate to say it, but most AMA doctors are on that same team with the drug companies and insurance companies.