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The hospitals are getting kickbacks for offering more expensive drugs. This is fraud, plain and simple. It should prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law:

The hospitals are getting kickbacks for offering more expensive drugs. This is fraud, plain and simple. It should prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law: they really need to start going after these hospitals and doctors that are colluding with the drug companies. "The PBMs negotiate discounts from drug companies and then help determine patient access to drugs. In theory, that is supposed to encourage PBMs to drive prices down on the drugs. But drug companies have very cleverly turned the system on its head. Before they give a discount to the PBMs, they raise the price each year. It is like a department store raising prices before a sale so that the sale price looks more appealing. Then the PBM can claim to have negotiated a great deal, and will pocket the rebates. In return, the drug companies want the PBM to make sure their competitors are disadvantaged." And once again, the patent system is being abused to no end. The patent office, swimming in money, just rubber stamps the same old patents over and over again: "78 percent of the drugs associated with new patents are not new drugs. They are existing ones. Instead of innovation, we are seeing secondary protections piled onto old drugs over and over again. They make minor medical modifications by adjusting the dosage or the delivery system." Someone seriously needs to sue the patent system for the enormous amount of financial damage they've caused to this country.

bluGill 8y ago
Slow down a little here. While it is true that new drugs are the old drugs with minor tweaks, that doesn't mean those tweaks are not valuable. Minor tweaks can change effectiveness, side effects, and other things that are often important.
mindslight 8y ago
> The hospitals are getting kickbacks for offering more expensive drugs. This is fraud, plain and simple. It should prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law 100x this. Much of the breakdown of trust in our society is due to existing laws and crimes being enforced extremely unevenly. Simple crimes committed by lower class individuals are prosecuted relentlessly, even when they are ultimately victimless or otherwise overly harsh. Meanwhile huge scale crimes committed en masse by companies are rarely pursued, and in the rare cases they are it basically results in civil slap-on-the-wrist fine that comes out of one quarter's profits. Law in general only works when it proactively deters bad behavior. Corporate counsel should be pointing out that such setups fit the shape of fraud, and advising the CEO/board that they'll personally be facing down prison terms. But rather than discouraging they enable - advising how to complexify the scheme to prefortify future defenses. The deviance has been so normalized that wider society just shrugs it off as them maximizing shareholder value. I have no idea how this can actually be remedied. The screws of demanding justice keep being turned up based on a desire to punish those who escape, yet those with the resources continue to insulate themselves just fine. We're effectively headed towards anarcho-capitalism for those at the top, and totalitarianism for those at the bottom.

bluGill 8y ago

Slow down a little here. While it is true that new drugs are the old drugs with minor tweaks, that doesn't mean those tweaks are not valuable. Minor tweaks can change effectiveness, side effects, and other things that are often important.

mindslight 8y ago

> The hospitals are getting kickbacks for offering more expensive drugs. This is fraud, plain and simple. It should prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law 100x this. Much of the breakdown of trust in our society is due to existing laws and crimes being enforced extremely unevenly. Simple crimes committed by lower class individuals are prosecuted relentlessly, even when they are ultimately victimless or otherwise overly harsh. Meanwhile huge scale crimes committed en masse by companies are rarely pursued, and in the rare cases they are it basically results in civil slap-on-the-wrist fine that comes out of one quarter's profits. Law in general only works when it proactively deters bad behavior. Corporate counsel should be pointing out that such setups fit the shape of fraud, and advising the CEO/board that they'll personally be facing down prison terms. But rather than discouraging they enable - advising how to complexify the scheme to prefortify future defenses. The deviance has been so normalized that wider society just shrugs it off as them maximizing shareholder value. I have no idea how this can actually be remedied. The screws of demanding justice keep being turned up based on a desire to punish those who escape, yet those with the resources continue to insulate themselves just fine. We're effectively headed towards anarcho-capitalism for those at the top, and totalitarianism for those at the bottom.