There have been many new biological drugs approved by the FDA to treat psoriasis since 2003 as one example of an inflated drug price that most lower income people can’t get access to because Medicaid and Medicare won’t pay for them due to the skyrocketing prices. The new blood thinner “Eliquis” is paid for by Medicaid and Medicare at $200 a bottle. The COPD inhalers which are fairly new are also paid for by the government without hesitation in the area of $150 a pop. Some states pay for the very expensive $400 and above hearing aids and some don’t. So why aren’t the new biological drugs that came out to treat psoriasis since 2003 paid for by the government?
I guess this is one moment where I’m going to answer the question I just asked of this articles readers. In the above linked article I posted to go with this article the author states these biological drugs to treat psoriasis will NOT be available to people who are on Medicaid and Medicare because of price. All the drug companies who have created their own biological psoriasis treatments have pushed people on Medicaid and Medicare away from receiving treatment with these drugs through the high cost of the drugs. Medicare Part D prescription drug plan will pay the bulk cost of “biological’s” but the co pay is between $1200 and $5000 which still keeps people from getting the biological’s.
The spin is a few of these biological drug companies have programs to supply the drugs free to low income patients who have private insurance only. Drug companies have stated in many articles I’ve read that if the patients have Medicare or Medicaid they will NOT be eligible for the free programs.
These biological psoriasis treatments are not life saving so Medicare and Medicaid do not recognize the inflated cost by drug companies as a necessary expense. The drug companies know this and want it this way. Back in 2003 when these biological psoriasis treatments were entering the drug marketplace they were affordable and insurance companies picked up the costs if a reasonable deductible was paid. After 2012 the insurance companies started to remove people with psoriasis because the payouts on the biological treatments were going up and getting extremely expensive.
The “Epipen Injector” used to treat heroin overdoses was attacked viciously by the U.S. government when the owner of the company jacked up the price so high only the really wealthy could afford them. Medicaid and Medicare in some states do cover generic Epipen’s but reject brand names. I’ve come to my conclusion about why this and other high drug prices are happening that keep some of these drugs out of the reach of many people who are on Medicare and Medicaid.
Come ON! of course it’s collusion between the “smartparenting.us” drug industry and members of congress. But when the collusion deals go bad it’s the drug industry that is forced to take the fall.