Time for Pharmacare

[dre]

4 hours ago, ?Impact said:

a significant percentage of those drug abusers got started because some drug company convinced doctors to prescribe them addictive pain killers to begin with.

The whole system is corrupt to the core. Drug companies pay billions of dollars per year to bribe doctors into prescribing as much of their products as possible. Prescribe enough drug X, and you get a free vacation. Prescribe enough of drug Y and you get paid big fucks by the company for speaking engagements on their behalf. Prescribe enough of drug Z, and you get paid a shitload of money to do research or for consulting.

Over 6 billion has been paid in bribes in the last couple of years alone. One of the good things about CongressCare (that people mistakenly call Obamacare) is the physician payments sunshine act which force these bribes to be disclosed. If you are an American you can visit OpenPaymentsData.CMS.gov to see how much your doctor collects in return for being a drug salesman. 

Thats probably the main reason we  have over-subscription.

Edited March 11, 2017 by dre

[Argus]

14 hours ago, BillyBeaver said:

I want our medical system to explore all alternatives to addictive pharmaceuticals. They should be a last resort applied in controlled medical settings. pain is natural, it reminds you you're alive. Physicians have been overprescribing opiates for the last decade. We are reaping the consequences.

The way to stop doctors from over-prescribing medication is through education and oversight, not through refusing to pay for pain medication.

Pain is natural? It reminds you you're alive? So speaks a man with no pain! People have committed suicide because they couldn't take constant pain! Pain destroys lives. It keeps people bed-bound or house-bound. It prevents them from HAVING a life.

 

 

[Argus]

14 hours ago, ?Impact said:

a significant percentage of those drug abusers got started because some drug company convinced doctors to prescribe them addictive pain killers to begin with.

I don't disagree that this happens. But I also don't think denying people needed pain medication is the way around it. I sure could have used some of those opiates a couple of weeks ago when I was laying in bed in pain. But there was no way for me to get them.

[August1991]

On 2/27/2017 at 1:18 PM, Argus said:

Another study has come out showing that Canadians could save billions every year if we had government paid pharmacare. It reiterates what others have said, that our individual payer system means we pay far more for prescription drugs than other countries around the world whose government schemes buy in bulk and get big discounts. I don't see the downside on this one. And plenty of upside if it's done right...

 

"...another study shows that a single provider makes life better ..."

Soviet Studies, 1937 

[BillyBeaver]

16 hours ago, Argus said:

The way to stop doctors from over-prescribing medication is through education and oversight, not through refusing to pay for pain medication.

Pain is natural? It reminds you you're alive? So speaks a man with no pain! People have committed suicide because they couldn't take constant pain! Pain destroys lives. It keeps people bed-bound or house-bound. It prevents them from HAVING a life.

 

 

 

Yes, a small percentage of chronic pain sufferers are debilitated by it. Everyday you spend alive is suffering the burden of existence. Pain in is basest form is an impetus to act, to change, to alter. Your body is telling you something is wrong and you must adapt to survive. Dulling that instinct through pharmaceuticals serves no purpose other than to deprive people of that which makes them human. Addiction makes slaves, pain motivates you to set yourself free.

Unless you're some masochist weirdo endorphin addict, but that's just the extreme side of the coin.

Edited March 12, 2017 by BillyBeaver

[dre]

5 hours ago, BillyBeaver said:

 

Yes, a small percentage of chronic pain sufferers are debilitated by it. Everyday you spend alive is suffering the burden of existence. Pain in is basest form is an impetus to act, to change, to alter. Your body is telling you something is wrong and you must adapt to survive. Dulling that instinct through pharmaceuticals serves no purpose other than to deprive people of that which makes them human. Addiction makes slaves, pain motivates you to set yourself free.

Unless you're some masochist weirdo endorphin addict, but that's just the extreme side of the coin.

If you have a chronic or acute medical condition or an injury that causes a lot of pain, you cant "adapt" to fix it. You can either suffer (sometimes quite severely) or take something. That said... I think Doctors DO over prescribe, mainly because pharmy companies pay them to.

[Argus]

9 hours ago, August1991 said:

"...another study shows that a single provider makes life better ..."

Soviet Studies, 1937 

So we should just ignore the fact that all the rest of the western world does this and has far lower prescription costs than us, August, because if we do the same as the French, Germans and Australians we'll be Commies?

[BillyBeaver]

Too much passing the buck between the provinces and federally when it comes to issues like this. feds say they would have to have full agreement from all provinces while individual provinces claim the feds don't do enough while proposing no initiatives of their own. Sometimes you have to pick a path and walk it to the end.

[August1991]

On 3/12/2017 at 11:27 AM, Argus said:

So we should just ignore the fact that all the rest of the western world does this and has far lower prescription costs than us, August, because if we do the same as the French, Germans and Australians we'll be Commies?

Yes, without the United States, we would all largely be in a Soviet pharmaceutical world.

American patent law, and the size of the American market, allow the rest of us to be free-riders.