With this week’s abundant press about Coleman trying to run away from Stevens’ taint (and me catching up on the latest latest cat news) I’m late to the game writing about Franken’s push for drug reform.
Star Tribune: “Franken urges U.S. to arrange lower drug prices for seniors”:
U.S. Senate candidate Al Franken called Wednesday for the federal government to negotiate lower prescription drug prices for seniors and to ban advertising that he says leads to unnecessary spending on medication.
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Franken said Coleman was “rewarded handsomely” with big contributions from drug companies for his support of the Medicare program, known as Part D. Coleman received $204,000 in contributions from the pharmaceutical and health products industry in this election cycle, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.
Pioneer Press: “Franken pushes senior drug reforms”:
When the Medicare prescription drug program was created in 2003, the legislation allowed private insurers to negotiate with pharmaceutical companies over prices but didn’t allow the federal government to negotiate for the entire group of eligible seniors.
If Medicare were able to get the negotiated prices Medic-aid secured in 2006 and 2007, Medicare insurers would have saved $3.7 billion on the top 100 prescribed drugs, according to a recent report from the U.S. House oversight committee.
Coleman votes for making it illegal for Medicare to negotiate prices with drug companies in 2003 and in 2005 votes against an amendment that would have granted that right. Coleman gets hundreds of thousands of dollars from Health Care and Big Pharma and taxpayers flip the bill on the $3.7 billion more we pay for drugs.
Franken proposed yesterday repealing the law Coleman voted for so we can negotiate drug costs, calling for allowing for the importation of pharmaceuticals from Canada and banning direct-to-consumer drug advertising. These are things that should have been done in the last six years to protect the interests of Minnesotans, not screw them over.
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News you can use: Government report last week on the operation of Medicare Part D (the Bush/Coleman drug plan) showed that drugs purchased through Part D averaged costing 30% more than the same drugs purchased through Medicare A&B (normal Medicare)which allows negotiation for prices. US consumers would save $70 billion a year if everyone paid the price negotiated by the Veteran’s Administration Health Care system.
The government tried to spin the news on Part D by pointing out that it had not cost as much as originally projected — this partly due to lower than expected enrollment and partly due to the administration habit of putting up ultrahigh projections so that when the bad news eventually arrives they can brag that it is better than they thought. The classic example has been deficit projections placed so high that they can then be beaten, although this year even those projections are being exceeded.
A large chunk of a Senior’s retirement income goes towards paying for needed medications. How shameful is it that Medicare was banned from getting lower costs for their recipients when teh Medicare Part D was designed??? Who were the Republican Reps. and Senators who voted against Medicare???
American made Drugs are cheaper in Canada is because Canada’s Health Care System has Price controls. Much of Europe is the same way. So therefore to make up the difference, Americans pay up to 400% as much for the same medications.
Interestingly enough who dictates what treatments and medications people need…The INSURANCE COMPANIES and DRUG COMPANIES. What happened to putting Health Care needs back into the hands of the Doctors???
Good for AL!!! Bad for Norm!!!
Remember, the Republicans want Social Security to die…It helps the elderly, the orphaned, the disabled….So of course they voted not to allow Medicare to negotiate with drug companies; It will mean less money to continue the whole program, and the privatizing of Social Security and Medicare will be complete.