The dirty little secret of government interference in health care – nobody needs to be a drug manufacturer.
As the drug shortages worsen, so does their impact on patient care, particularly in hospitals. The inability to get crucial medicines has disrupted chemotherapy, surgery and care for patients with infections and pain. At least 15 deaths since 2010 have been blamed on the shortages, which have set a record high in each of the last five years.
[…]
Most of the drugs in short supply are sterile injected drugs that are the workhorses of hospitals and are normally inexpensive because they’ve long been available as generics.
The FDA says the main reason for the shortages is manufacturing deficiencies leading to production shutdowns. Other reasons include companies ending production of some drugs with tiny profit margins, consolidation in the generic drug industry and limited supplies of some ingredients.
Related slow learners.
“… nobody needs to be a drug manufacturer.”
Exactly.
How about continued squeezes on generic drug makers’ prices from “single payers” like OHIP, and large insurers? Unsurprisingly, the response from generic makers is to reduce the production of these drugs in favour of products with higher profit margins.
As long as there is the least bit of freedom in a market, market forces will eventually prevail. Unless the large buyers try to tie products together (“We won’t buy X from you unless you also sell us Y at price Z” – which I wouldn’t put past them), eventually they will have pay higher prices to generic makers to entice them to produce these drugs.
The only question is how many people will die in the interim.
Looks like too many Ontaririo doctors are ordering brand name drugs and not checking the “use generic equivalent if necessary” box. I know the drug plan I had in Texas had different levels of co-pay for name brand, generic and some other option that escapes me now. Perhaps our resident Doc can shed some light into this brouhaha.
I find the bragging from the FDA about how many shortages they have prevented amusing. How many doses have they actually produced in their labs? Just like government bureaucrats, create a problem through regulation then claim credit for partially alleviating the problem.
“The court battles reflect moves by the deficit-strapped Ontario government to cut health care costs as it struggles to balance its books over the next several years. The $16-billion provincial deficit has forced the government to review everything from soaring drug plan costs to public sector wages and financial transfers to restrain spending growth as the economy slows down, ”
Soaring drug plan costs,which the Losertario Supreme court just upped some more by stifling generics…check
public sector wages(and jobs) keep increasing at a rate of about 25x inflation(not to mention benefits)….check
“we are not getting our share as a have-not province from AB/Sask….whimper,whine….check
But not ONE word of killing the eco-cultists green plans/economy,which is killing Morontario,but not quite fast enough for my liking…check
McDildo is well on his way to making them the 1st commie province in Canuckistan. Boob Rae would be so proud.
Maybe he should change drug production over to the Jamican/Somali gangs. They never seem to have a shortage!
Kevin B @8:51
“We won’t buy X from you unless you also sell us Y at price Z”
Yes, this is quite common especially with hospital consortiums and pharmacy benefit managers in the US. Lipitor going generic in the US has exposed this practice.
In Ontario, generics are REQUIRED to be dispensed for the Ontario Benefit Plan….you cannot ask for the brand and be willing to pay the difference. Generally (with some exceptions), it’s payment 100% for brand or get generic, at the price the Ontario government dictates by fiat.
The US shortage problem on injectables is serious. Because of the low profit margins, generic injectables are made in only a few facilities in the US. The FDA has shut down at least one of these facilities in Ohio, due to manufacturing problems.This is indirectly as a result of the heparin fiasco which lead to several deaths in Canada and the US.
“Man made disaster” pretty much covers it I’d say.
Keeping a supply chain full of perishable stuff like injectable drugs is in truth a fairly difficult thing to do. Politicians in this country have been messing with these companies for a really long time now, and it seems they’ve finally managed to kill the Golden Goose here. It is no longer profitable to manufacture drugs for the North American market IN North America.
Therefore we will be buying them ad hoc on the open international market just like Somalia. Isn’t that special? I’m going to be quite confident that the “sterile” injectables from China are actually sterile, or even that the bottles contain what the label says. Not!
Canadian hospitals will do what Somali hospitals do. They will hoard the drugs for THE PEOPLE WHO PAY (under the table but they -will- pay), also for those who are hooked up like doctor’s families,and the rest of us will get coloured water. Or possibly be left in a snowdrift in the parking lot.
I have had a bit of experience with this matter.
I qualify for the Ontario Drug Assistance Plan.
I have had a prescription with say 10 repeats…filled then had it refused….and given a separate form to be filled out by my MD.
Bizarre…the prescription had already authorized the drug…but a separate form was required…according to the MD…the government was trying to force a generic rather than the brand name drug.
In principle this is commendable but when my drug plan was my credit card…I found the cheaper generics were not necessarilly equal…and at times had unpleasant side effects.
There is always an oil refinery shut down in Western Canada. One has a fire, another shuts down for refitting and on and on. As a result despite being awash in oil, we have high prices because a tiny part of our consumption has to come from afar.
In Alberta, a power plant always seems to be offline creating a deficit in supply. The price for the whole market becomes the price of the small portion imported.
Drug shortage? Simply a scam and nothing more. Its pretty hard for the Canadian government to control prices of a non-existent supply. Threaten the buggers with a shortened patent period and product will show up. If they won’t produce a product in sufficient amounts, let someone who wants the business do it.
Scar: Generics are drugs off of patent already. If a company with the monopoly thanks to a patent can’t make money at the price the government is mandating, what makes you think the state confiscating their property would improve the situation?
The problem is the mandating of price while expecting unlimited supply. This comes from the fact liberals who took econ201 in their first year of university then spent 6 years ‘learning’ they are smarter than fundimental supply and demand.
Right you are, duffman. Scar seems to think that central government control will solve the problem. Sort of like the tall foreheads in the Norway bureaucracy and the butter shortage in that country that has pushed the price of butter up to the levels of cocaine.
Govt ‘regulation’ is what brought us to this point, Scar.
Well Scar, take a look at Oncolytics Biotech, a Calgary based company developing a novel cancer therapy. In all the trials so far they have not been able to find a killer dose of their product, REOLYSIN, so it is as safe a therapy as we have in this world. They have shown promising results on cancers such as pancreatic and head and neck, which currently are end of the line killers. It is expected that the therapy could be effective on 75% of cancers.
Oncolytics has been developing this therapy, going though the regulatory process, for well over ten years now. It has cost them billions and though the therapy has shown itself to be safe and effective, the company still cannot sell this product until the Government says so. Now you want to shorten the time frame under which their patent is useful.
This would only further hamper their ability to make a (dirty?) profit. They would also never be able to pay back the investors who have risked billions to help bring the product to market, hoping for a big return. How many new drug companies would get started if the Government ensures it, and it’s investors, can never make money? None, Scar, none. How does society benefit from that? It obviously doesn’t which makes me wonder something. Scar, are you a teacher or a journalis by some chance?
And all the shortages of diesel, electricity, and drugs have nothing to do with companies creating shortages to justify their position?
Capitalism thrives on competition. Expecting competition from oligopolies is a bit rich. It doesn’t happen much so sometimes the government might need to twig the rules to force competition.
Look at the billions Canadians pay for long distance phone calls. Today there is no such thing as long distance. Once it’s on the network it’s free to the moon and stars. Long distance is free on Gmail. I pay a few dollars a month to have unlimited long distance on my computer complete with a phone number. While capitalism works like a damn, the oligarchs are screwing people.
When are people going to learn, income redistribution, (ie. cheap drugs in this case) of any sort will not work? We see if every time something is regulated to unsustainable profit levels.
markon
“Scar, are you a teacher or a journalist by some chance?”
Nope – I’m a capitalist. So when it comes to dealing with drug companies, the government isn’t supposed to assume any bargaining position even though they pay for billions in drugs. Just hang out the teat and have at’er.
the bear
“We see if every time something is regulated to unsustainable profit levels.”
Ya! I am not crying my eyes out for the drug companies any time soon. So it’s perfectly fine for anti-capitalist, anti-competition oligarchs to screw us?
The bottom of the header article shows true capitalism at work.
“In one case that’s among those under investigation by Congress, a vendor outside the normal supply chain offered to sell a hospital a vial of a cancer drug that normally costs about $12 for more than $990”
Obviously the 12 is too low and the 990 is too high but if the market was left alone and true competition was allowed to thrive without government interference the price would have found a level that satisfied all players and in all probability no shortages.
One of the beauties of living in the Third World is you can buy just about everything in the local pharmacies over-the-counter — most of the stuff you need a prescription for in Canada after waiting to finally get a Doctor’s appointment under our “superior” socialized medical system, is easily available in the “backward countries”. Plus it’s usually cheap — either subsidized by the World Health Organization, or simply because there are not the same thieving distributors who pocket the big profit bucks en route from manufacturer to retail outlets. Many pharamacists will do emergency injections for you on site simply as a courtesy or for a small fee.
So many common diseases/ailments can be self-treated — and huge costs avoided — if the Canadian government only trusted us. Ironically, the WHO trusts Third Worlders — who are often illiterate or semi-literate — with self-administered medicine treatment, but Western advanced societies are nannied to death by our medical system.
scar; If you are a capitalist ,as you say you are,then you must be a dairy farmer,a doctor,a fisherman from Atlantic Canada or one of the other subsidised industries that thrive in Canada.You have no idea how market forces work or you wouldnt be saying what you are.
So many common diseases/ailments can be self-treated — and huge costs avoided — if the Canadian government only trusted us. Ironically, the WHO trusts Third Worlders — who are often illiterate or semi-literate — with self-administered medicine treatment, but Western advanced societies are nannied to death by our medical system.
Subsidization through regulation.
The government. Always wanting to make health-care more affordable over your dead body. o matter how inefficient said system is.
Using regulation to kill any progress, or even stability.
Get them out of medicine completely. They are nincompoops medically wise.
This is why famines are mostly human caused.
Government control.
Time to scrap Health-care Canada.
For a back to private insurance system.
@ Revnant Dream
Unless of course you have any pre-existing conditions in which case no insurance co. will want you or the cost is out of reach. We have friends in the states that pay 800 a month for a family of 3 and they are all healthy.
peterj
How much do you think you pay by payroll taxes, fees, & provincial tax for “Free” health-care a month? Healthy-care that does not include dental or optometry? Unless of course your Native or on welfare. Look at your pay check & figure at least 3/4 goes to health in taxes.
As for preexisting conditions they should be subsidized like AISH is in Alberta. An assured income & treatment. Any civilized people looks after its own wounded.
By the way Dental services have no waiting lists,there are practitioners on every corner. Same with Eye care. Why? Because they are not run by the Government. Insurance is relativity cheap or supported by your company.
Not disagreeing with you. Was a statement, but do you honestly believe payroll taxes or any other taxes would go down if we went private ? Main reason for high prices in the USA is litigation. They need tort reform.
peterj
Nope don’t think any taxes go down these days.
It would take a complete crash for that to happen. That or the elimination of Public Unions. The money would just be used for bigger wages for public Union employee’s that are already bloated.If not retirement benefits, Its why Public Medicine does not work. Nor public Education, Public companies, Police like the now destroyed RCMP, or anything these Unions control.
Franky the best option would be to privatize all, bureaucratic organizations, including Universities.
Government should only be for defense & over site.
Revnant Dream and peterj, you are both right when one carefully analyzes your comments between 2:55 and 6:20. Cheers.