By Senator Bill Diamond
There are
very few people I know who aren’t concerned about the high cost of prescription
drugs. Seniors, in particular, can find themselves spending massive sums out of
their fixed income on medicine they need to stay alive and healthy. Studies
show that about one in four Americans who take
prescription medications struggle to pay for them.
About 8 percent don’t take their medicines as
prescribed because they simply can’t afford them.
While this
isn’t a new problem, it has gotten markedly worse in recent years, as the cost
of many life-saving and life-sustaining medications has skyrocketed. For example, in 1996 the price of a vial of
insulin was $21. In 2019, that same vial, which contains the same product and
doesn’t cost any more to produce, was about $275. That is a 1200 percent
increase. Just this year, the price of Humira, a popular treatment for
arthritis and other conditions, was raised by 7 percent, after being raised 19
percent over the previous two years.
The COVID-19
pandemic has exasperated these issues, too. Recent reports show that since January of
this year, pharmaceutical companies have raised the price of 245 different
drugs by an average of 23.8 percent. We also recently learned that Gilead
Sciences, the maker of the FDA-approved COVID-19 treatment Remdesivir, intends to charge patients with private
insurance $3,120 per treatment course. To make matters worse, while the
treatment was invented by Gilead, almost $70 million in taxpayer funds was
spent developing Remdesivir.
The
regulation of drug prices mostly falls to Congress, but
unfortunately progress on that front has stalled due to
partisan politics in Washington. However, in Maine the Legislature does have
some ability to protect consumers and offer relief for Mainers dealing with
expensive prescription drug prices.
That’s why,
in the past year the Legislature has taken bold, bipartisan action to help
lower prescription drug costs for Mainers. We passed a law allowing the wholesale
importation of lower-cost prescription drugs from Canada; another that expanded prescription drug price transparency; and still
another that established the prescription drug affordability board.
We
also expanded the Low Cost Drugs for the
Elderly and Disabled program and capped out-of-pocket insulin costs at
$35 per month for many insurance plans.
While some
of these programs and policies are still being set up, some are starting to
have an impact. Maine recently received an “A” grade on prescription
drug price transparency from the Catalyst for Payment Reform and the Source on
Healthcare Price and Competition at the University of California Hastings
College of Law. But there’s still a lot of work to do.
We need to
make sure Mainers don’t get nickel-and-dimed for medicine that they need. No
person should have to choose between their medications and putting food on
their table or paying their mortgage. I will keep pushing to make sure the
state is doing everything in our power to protect Maine consumers and lower the
cost of prescription drugs.
If you have
any questions or concerns, please feel free to reach out. You can call my
office at 207-287-1515 or send me an email at diamondhollyd@aol.com. I’m here
to help.<
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