Health Insurance: Sexist or Greedy?

[graywarrior]

Or both? I live in MA and have the opportunity to switch health insurance once a year. I switched a few months ago and just picked up a prescription that cost $20 from my previous insurance company. Today, I paid $40 for the same prescription.

The prescription is Estrace, used by women for various reasons (look it up, if you're interested.) This medication had originally cost $10 more than all my other precriptions. Now, however, it's $30 more! I'm brining it back. I cannot afford $40 per month while I'm still in school. I suppose I should be grateful that I have coverage, but why should I have to pay $40 for a prescription just because I am female???????

Grrrrrr.

[cbayer]

1. Is it because you are getting the brand name and not the generic?

:shrug:

[graywarrior]

5. There is no generic for this. Another ripoff!

[cbayer]

9. I thought there was. See this link:

http://menopause.emedtv.com/estrace/generic-estrace.html

[graywarrior]

14. Those are the tablets. I need the creme.

[cbayer]

15. Ah, got it. Wonder how soon it will come off patent.

[graywarrior]

16. When I dry up and blow away....lol

[cbayer]

20. LOL!! I know of what you speak!

:rofl:

[graywarrior]

22. !

:evilgrin:

[Tuesday Afternoon]

2. both my medications went up two months ago. I think it is a price increase

from the manufacturer and is being passed down the line. One went up ten dollars and the other went up five. :shrug:

[graywarrior]

6. My pharmacist told me it was the difference in insurance companies.

[Tuesday Afternoon]

19. well, I don't have insurance . . .and that is what they told me at the pharmacy

I was paying $90.oo for one and $10.oo for the other.

Now I am paying $100.oo for the one and $15.oo for the other.

:shrug:

[Lydia Leftcoast]

3. The U.S. is one of the few countries in the world that does not negotiate drug prices for its people

I once translated the vanity autobiography of the head of a Japanese pharmaceutical firm, and he came right out and said that they jack up their prices for the U.S. market because there's nothing to stop them, unlike most other First World countries.

[graywarrior]

7. Grrrrrrrrrrrr! ! ! !

[Broderick]

4. The whole industry is nothing but Greed

ALL of healthcare. We need single payer and the elimination of insurance companies that bilk and bilk and bilk.

[graywarrior]

10. Damn right!

My doctors are sooooo freaking frustrated with insurance companies. My pain doctor actually treated me without approval because I was in such pain and required a hip injection. He then fought my insurance company for months before getting paid.

[lumberjack_jeff]

8. Gender is the biggest determinant of lifetime medical costs.

Men spend $268,000 on medical care in their lifetime. Because of their longer lifespan, women spend $361,000.

http://www.amcp.org/data/jmcp/JMCPSupp_April08_S2-S6.pdf
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1361028/

Healthcare reform removes gender as a rating criteria. Those greater costs of a longer life are now being shifted onto men.

I don't know why this Rx costs more now, but institutional sexism isn't the culprit.

[graywarrior]

12. Well, that's an interesting bit of info!

[rug]

11. Why did you say I could look it up?

:scared:

[graywarrior]

13. Because it involves vaginas.

:evilgrin:

[ElboRuum]

17. Not sexist, plenty of greed,

Most medications are going up in price, and I suppose it has more to do with the demand for them as to which are going up more than others.

[graywarrior]

23. But why would one insurance company charge $20 and this one charge $40?

[ElboRuum]

26. Depends on the plan...

There may be differences in what is covered and what isn't and by how much. Additionally, I'm sure that some medications on the first company's plans may be more than the equivalent on a second.

Like I said, it's about money, the ability to maximize profits for shareholders. If there is financial benefit for them that allows them to cover less for this drug than others, then they'll do it.

[Jamastiene]

18. Both. n/t

[customerserviceguy]

21. Not enough information

Do you know with certainty that a prescription used by a man would cost $40 under your new insurance?

It simply looks to me as all that's happened is that you switched insurances to something that has lousier prescription coverage. Have you tried to find this through online Canadian pharmacies? I get my Protonix that way, but I have a high-deductable health plan, and I'd pay a bloody fortune for it through the joke pharmacy (Caremark) that my plan uses.

[graywarrior]

24. I never tried a Canadian pharmacy. Thanks for the idea.

Do you pay cash for your prescriptions? How does that work?

[customerserviceguy]

27. You're welcome

I use a credit card to pay. Often, the drugs are manufactured in Turkey, but once I got some made in New Zealand. They ship through the UK or Germany.

A worry I had was of getting the genuine article. Well, I have breakthrough symptoms with the generic version of Protonix, and I haven't had any with the stuff that I've been getting through Canadian pharmacies, so I know they're giving me the real deal. It's about a third or a fourth of what I'd pay through Caremark, which supposedly has some sort of 'deal' with my health insurer.

[PassingFair]

25. Good question. My daughter...

has PCOS, and needs to take hormones to regulate
her cycle (she just turned 16).

The "pill" as prescribed to her, costs me
FIFTY dollars a month. I also have health/
prescription insurance.