2 ms·

I think that they have both high margins on drugs (my gut estimate would be ten times what the rest of the world pays, but it looks like it is ordinarily only 2

by uiri 9y ago

I think that they have both high margins on drugs (my gut estimate would be ten times what the rest of the world pays, but it looks like it is ordinarily only 2-5 times [0]) and they're selling a lot of drugs. It is disingenuous to claim that the US consumes 9 times more prescription drugs than the world average. The reality is probably closer to 2-5 times more drugs and that these drugs are 2-5 times more expensive by virtue of being sold in the US. [0] https://www.vox.com/a/health-prices https://www.vox.com/a/health-prices

NumberCruncher 9y ago
Price difference may be a valid argument. On the other hand in my home country we had some big pharmaceutical companies (compared to the size of the country) exporting drugs world wide. I thought that for example the pain killers I knew as I child would be used everywhere on the world. When I moved to Germany I realized that I was wrong. There are tons of different drugs for the same purpose with the same ingredients sold by different producers. Therefore only becasue you in the US buy some expensive - and highly addictive - pain killers you are not automatically financing the R&D of pain killers sold in Europe by Europian companies to the Europian people. Let me be a smart ass and improve your calculation: 45% of drug revenue is generated by 5% of earth's population: 45% / 5% = 9 but you do not compare this number to 1 but to 55% of drug revenue is generated by 95% of earth's population: 55% / 95% = 0.58 So a US citizen spends 9 / 0.58 = 15.54 more on drugs as a non US citizen. Even if price difference is a valid argument, this number is still too high.