The Healthcare Channel learned of a specific example of pharmaceutical price inflation that serves as a good case for discussing the merits of various healthcare reform measures being considered by Congress.
The generic drug maker Actavis recently raised the price of a generic drug, Acetesol HC (hydrocortisone/acetic acid ear drops), by more than 1000%. The old price was approximately $20 USD. The new price is more than $200 USD.
We asked the company to explain this dramatic change in price. Actavis U.S. declined our invitation to appear on The HCC. According to a company spokesperson, the reason the price of acetesol was raised more than 1000% was because Actavis is now the sole manufacturer of the drug. Other generic drug manufacturers stopped making it for reasons unrelated to Actavis. Actavis now has monopoly pricing power and raised the price to match what the drug was selling for as a branded patented drug, even though the drug is off patent and still generic.
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2 comments:
Greed has also contributed to the shortage of generic Toprol-XL
again a good example, that price has nothing to do with cost, if there is no competition, price will be adjusted to the maximum which consumers are willing to pay
with competition the price will fall to marginal cost
the only way to decrease healthcare cost is to increase competition
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