The uninsured patient, maybe. If you ran the math on the average marginal cost to the consumer for atorvastatin (Lipitor), I'd imagine it would be much, much lo

The uninsured patient, maybe. If you ran the math on the average marginal cost to the consumer for atorvastatin (Lipitor), I'd imagine it would be much, much lower. For one thing, the patent has expired and Lipitor now has substitutable generics available. Even before that, consumer co-pay for brand-name drugs is rarely more than $50 (usually much lower), and that gets whittled down further as you can convince your doctor to write a larger prescription. It's also tax deductible if you set up your HSA or FSA appropriately.