Let's compare plans: Prescription Drugs

[Feanorcurufinwe]

John Kerry's Plan to Cut Costs in prescription Drugs

(1) CUT GREED OUT OF RX PRICES. Pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) process hundreds of millions of pharmaceutical claims per year giving them the clout to get discounts from bulk buying and extra rebates for using their power to make sure certain drugs are covered or figuring market share. Some estimates show that rebates and incentives may account for as much as 10 percent of the $161 billion that Americans are estimated to have spent on prescription drugs in 2002. However, PBMs often do not pass these savings on to consumers.

John Kerry’s plan would require transparency rules for PBMs that do business with the Federal government to clearly show what savings they are receiving from the industry and from bulk purchasing.

(2) END LOOPHOLES THAT PREVENT GENERICS FROM COMING TO THE MARKET. In 2000, the average brand name prescription cost $45.96 (238%) more than the average generic prescription ($65.29/brand Rx minus $19.33/generic Rx). Eleven successful patent challenges saved consumers $27.4 billion in costs by getting more affordable prescriptions to the market. But there are still loopholes.

* One painkiller received 3 years of exclusivity for minor changes in dosage (one patent for 25 mg increments and another for 50 mg). These additional patents alone cost consumers $727 million.
* One popular antibiotic has been sued for unlawfully paying its competitors up to $200 million to stop developing and marketing a generic alternative.

(3) ASSURE THOSE WITHOUT PRESCRIPTION DRUG COVERAGE DON’T PAY MORE. Americans without drug coverage pay at least 50 percent more for the exact same medication as their insured neighbors because they do not get the benefits of bulk purchasing. Some states, like Maine, have tried to extend the same discount that Medicaid beneficiaries receive to other populations. The Supreme Court ruled that the pharmaceutical industry could not shut down the Maine program before it starts. As President, John Kerry would help states provide discounts on prescriptions drugs. Kerry would also give states incentives to contract with companies for better rates for prescription drugs.

(4) SAVE BILLIONS AND IMPROVE CARE BY REDUCING PRESCRIPTION DRUG ERRORS. Nearly $76 billion in annual health care costs are due to patients incorrectly taking their medications. Taking medications incorrectly accounts for 10 percent of all hospital admissions, and 25% of hospital admissions among the elderly and 23% of nursing home admissions. John Kerry believes we must institute an aggressive patient education programs, develop new technologies to help patients understand their prescriptions, and help health providers know when patients are not taking prescriptions correctly. Kerry will also set a goal to implement Computerized Prescription Order Entry (CPOE) in every hospital in the country by the end of the decade. CPOE alerts physicians to the possibility of drug interaction, allergy, and overdose and eliminates the problems posed by illegible handwritten prescriptions.

(5) A QUALITY PRESCRIPTION DRUG BENEFIT. Many politicians have a prescription drug plan to benefit pharmaceutical companies not seniors. John Kerry supports a real meaningful affordable drug benefit that:

* Doesn’t force seniors into HMOs;
* Run by Medicare – not private insurance companies who can charge seniors whatever they want;
* Doesn’t undermine drug coverage that seniors have today.
http://www.johnkerry.com/issues/prescriptions.html#b1

What are the other candidate's plans to cut costs in prescription drugs?

[OneBlueSky]

1. well, it's a hell of a lot better than anything else I've seen . . .

I don't know what the solution to the prescription drug problem is, but these points are certainly a good start . . . the more I hear about Kerry, the more I like him (thought his membership in S&B still puts me on edge) . . .

btw, that $87 billion going to Iraq (or, more precisely, Halliburton, Bechtel, and other FOBs) would go a long way toward solving the problem . . .

[Feanorcurufinwe]

2. I'm pretty sure Dean does have a prescription drug plan.

Let's see it and talk policy. Which plan is better?

I know Kerry can't be the only one who's spoken on this issue...