Presently I have Blephartis, a common bacterial eye infection that can be healed naturally with care or in persistent cases with an anti bacterial ointment used in pets or people with a cost of $12.00. To get that I have to spend $125 to an urgent care clinic or wait for a public clinic to see me, to bill the government the same or close as I am on Medicaid as I am so poor I don't even qualify for Obamacare. So I am going homeopathy and hoping for the best.
The reality is that even the most innocuous of drugs that are affordable and attainable with careful consult by a nurse practitioner or pharmacist the cost of care and treatment would be both reasonable and attainable for all. There is your health care for all. But the reality is that Big Pharma runs a stranglehold on care in ways that include big time lobbying and in turn public manipulation.
This is an article about Big Pharmas current lobbyist in DC. Even Il Duce, whoops I mean Donald Trump, pointed out that the former heir apparent, Jeb Bush, had a head of a pharmaceutical sitting front row in a debate.
The irony is not lost on those who are running to vote for Trump, the sheer bullshit of our politics that follow the adage "do as I say, not as I do" down to the idea that never let the right hand know what the left is doing. So as they shake hands with you they are taking checks with the other. So if people are wondering why Il Duce is succeeding, well here is another adage - those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it. For the record the comparison to Il Duce or even Francisco Franco (right down to the Make "America/Spain great again mantra) is by far more reasonable than any with the most over used - Hitler.
But I digress or not. Frankly this is the reality, we are manipulated, lied to and utterly ignored when it comes to the idea that there is anything for "all." It is about profit, money and branding. And who knows more about that then a reality star.
And in all reality Obamacare is utter crap it did nothing not one fucking thing about the rising costs of medical care. From the douche Shrkelli to the faux congressional hearing on drug prices jack offs, whoops I mean jack ups, to the duplicity of medical professionals who are paid by drug companies to promote drugs, to the FDA that has made testing and licensing such an arduous process that the reality is that money is the reality, health is the after affect.
Health care is secondary not primary when it comes to legislation to actually improve both the quality and costs of health and this is why we sit at home and watch ad after ad for varying hospitals and drugs and are told they are so great and we should go there. And we know this how? They told us and isn't that enough? I still think my favorite ad is for the drug to treat bi-polar depression. That falls under the "youhavegottobefuckingkiddingme" one as anyone who is that severely ill and self diagnosing and treating themselves via a late night commercial needs to check into the hospital that advertises their care immediately thereafter.
Ask yourself if they have a drug for that.
Ask Your Doctor if This Ad Is Right for You
By ELISABETH ROSENTHAL
THE NEW YORK TIMES
A LITTLE more than a decade ago, most health care Advertising was confined to mass-market drugs, and hospitals and doctors generally considered the practice tacky or ethically dubious. More often than not, the ads appeared in unassuming places like cheaper women’s magazines or the New York subway — for decades New Yorkers sat beneath ubiquitous rainbow posters for Dr. Jonathan Zizmor that promised to conquer blemishes: 212-594-SKIN!
But today, Health Care Advertising is skyrocketing and likely to turn up in business-class lounges in airport terminals or the Jitney to the Hamptons. It occupies the center spreads and back covers of elite magazines alongside plugs for luxury watches, jewelry and resorts. On television it has found its way into prime-time slots: presidential debates, primary campaign coverage and even the Super Bowl/
The ads are targeting a far more rarefied market than in the past: patients with good insurance or those who can pay out of pocket for the priciest drugs. Hospitals and clinics have also jumped into the fray: What hospital or clinic these days doesn’t trumpet its services to its customer base (people formerly known as patients)?
Drug companies, which once focused mainly on promoting products like painkillers that might be prescribed to millions, now advertise costly niche medicines that might be prescribed to thousands. Ads from the medical profession don’t focus on small-bore items like Dr. Z’s blemish remedies, but big-ticket treatments like joint replacements and cancer care.
The health care industry spent $14 billion on advertising in 2014, according to Kantar Media, a jump of nearly 20 percent since 2011. That includes over-the-counter medications, but not sponsorships (the Super Bowl had two health care systems as partners). While magazine advertising has dropped off somewhat with the withering of the publishing industry, television advertising has risen 55 percent for hospitals and 30 percent for prescription drugs in that period.
“The stage is beyond crowded, and everyone wants to be seen as shaping their brand and being the patients’ partner of choice,” said Lisa Kerins, a managing director at the Nielsen Company, who said that ad spending for hospitals had increased by 33 percent since the beginning of 2012.
Last weekend’s episode of “60 Minutes,” for example, included advertising for four expensive drugs and two hospitals, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center and NYU Langone Medical Center. Meanwhile, The New York Times Magazine on the same weekend featured glossy full-page promotions for hospitals in New York, Denver and Boston, competing for space with ads for spas and hotels.
Holly Campbell, a spokeswoman for PhRMA, the pharmaceutical manufacturers trade association, said that advertisements help patients make better decisions. Drug makers are “designing their advertising to provide scientifically accurate information to help patients better understand their health care and treatment options,” she said.
But as the volume and spending on advertising increases, health economists and doctors are raising concerns about the trend, which they say increases prices and encourages patients to seek out more expensive and, often, inappropriate treatment.
The United State and New Zealand are the only two countries that allow consumer advertising for drugs. The American Medical Association recommended a ban last year on advertising for drugs and medical devices directed toward consumers. The group was concerned “about the negative impact of commercially driven promotions” on health care and costs, said Dr. Patrice A. Harris, the chairwoman-elect of the association, in issuing the decision. “Direct-to-consumer advertising also inflates demand for new and more expensive drugs, even when these drugs may not be appropriate.”
Hospital ads are coming under similar scrutiny. When Dr. Yael Schenker, a physician at the University of Pittsburgh who specializes in end-of-life care, studied advertisements for cancer centers, she found that “there was not much actual information, and what there was focused much more on benefits than on risks.”
“The narrative was emotional,” she continued, “and there was nothing about cost.”
Her research, published in the Annals of Internal Medicine in 2014, “debunks the notion that advertising empowers patients to make better choices,” she said.
Advertisements tend to drive patients to the latest expensive treatments and patented drugs. The four drugs promoted on “60 Minutes” included a new heart failure medication called Entresto (generally $390 to $450 per month); Pradaxa, a blood thinner ($350 to $450); Orencia, for moderate to severe rheumatoid arthritis ($3,500 to $3,800); and Lyrica ($350 to $450), for foot pain sometimes associated with longtime diabetes. All four, which may be partly or entirely covered by insurance, treat conditions for which there are generic drugs that cost a tiny fraction of the price.
In 2010, the cholesterol drug Lipitor, then still protected by a patent, was the most heavily advertised medication in the United States. By 2012, once its patent expired and its price dropped, thanks to generic competition, it fell off the ad charts — even though its utility hadn’t changed one iota.
While some of the new drugs may offer benefits over their less-expensive predecessors, many do not. Federal regulations do not require drug advertisements directed at consumers to say how much a medicine costs, how well it works or if there is a cheaper option. As a result, doctors say patients often wind up asking for medicines and treatments that they don’t need or that are far more expensive than alternatives.
During the presidential debates and primaries, commercials have appeared for Neulasta, an injected drug used for some cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy to help the immune system rebound faster. The ad featured two loving sisters, one of whom has cancer, enjoying a seafood meal near a beach. It urged viewers to “ask your doctor about Neulasta.”
Neulasta costs about $5,000 per injection in the United States, and generated $4.6 billion in sales in 2014 for its maker, Amgen. But why the need to promote it? While Neulasta is more or less standard after certain types of chemotherapy, it is discretionary for others, but if a patient asks, the doctor is more likely to prescribe it. More important, perhaps, several generic versions of the drug that will be much cheaper are nearing approval, so Amgen wants patients to request their brand.
Worried patients are, of course, a great captive audience. Television coverage during the debates and primaries has featured many commercials for new drugs to treat Type 2 diabetes, a condition that is often associated with the overweight and is most common in middle age and beyond.
Ads for the condition have increased 200 percent in the last three years, Nielsen found. Even though older, cheaper drugs for Type 2 diabetes are effective for most people — and, doctors say, should generally be the first line of treatment — the ads have promoted an array of new injections and pills, including Tuojeo, Farxiga and Victoza (each of which costs between $500 and $700 per month).
Ads for the condition have increased 200 percent in the last three years, Nielsen found. Even though older, cheaper drugs for Type 2 diabetes are effective for most people — and, doctors say, should generally be the first line of treatment — the ads have promoted an array of new injections and pills, including Tuojeo, Farxiga and Victoza (each of which costs between $500 and $700 per month).
During the 1980s and ’90s, the Food and Drug Administration set some rules for medical advertising — then in its infancy — to ensure that patients got accurate, balanced information. Current regulations mandate that manufacturers advertise their drugs only for the disease for which they received federal approval, and that they list all potential side effects and risks.
Yet clever marketing departments have danced around those limits. Some drug ads, for example, feature emotional patients telling their success stories, followed at the very end by a rapid-fire litany of all the things that could go wrong. Others are called “help-seeking ads,” in which a specific drug isn’t named (so that its side effects don’t have to be mentioned) but just enough information is provided about the condition, including a website for advice, to guide you to the branded medicine.
Both types of commercials were on display during this year’s Super Bowl, an event traditionally associated with ads for beer and cars. One featured a cute pink coiled human intestine with a face and legs running to the toilet thanks to a condition called irritable bowel syndrome, which can cause diarrhea. That ad recommended a pill called Xifaxin, which costs about $1,850 per month, although gastroenterologists frequently prescribe dietary changes, stress management and over-the-counter pills.
Another ad promoted Jublia, a new topical drug for toenail fungus that costs thousands of dollars for a full course of treatment. Complete cure rates in studies — under 20 percent after 48 weeks of use — aren’t mentioned in the ads.
Meanwhile, social media erupted over a one-minute help-seeking ad during the Super Bowl about “opioid-induced constipation.” The commercial depicted a well-heeled sufferer in a business suit roaming the streets window shopping for prunes and jealously eyeing those who could evacuate more readily — including a dog. AstraZeneca, which was behind the ad, makes Movantik, the first once-a-day drug specifically approved for the constipation that frequently accompanies opioid use.
Though dietary changes and dozens of over-the-counter medications often remedy the problem, Movantik sells for $280 to $350 per month, depending on whether you have a coupon.
Though dietary changes and dozens of over-the-counter medications often remedy the problem, Movantik sells for $280 to $350 per month, depending on whether you have a coupon.
Prescription drug makers are the kingpin of health care advertising, spending $4.8 billion a year, but the rest of the health care industry is catching up. Hospital advertising, according to Kantar Media, has risen 40 percent, to $2.3 billion, from 2011 to 2014. Among the major spenders are NYU Langone ($22 million annually) and the City of Hope, a cancer hospital near Los Angeles ($20 million), according to Nielsen.
Even clinics hawk their wares. Ads for Cyberknife Centers, which offer a branded machine that delivers radiation for hard-to-treat tumors, grace billboards and have appeared on the inside cover of The New Yorker. (Many cancer centers offer similar treatment but use a different manufacturer’s machine.)
And while drug ads are regulated by the F.D.A., hospital advertisements are not, though experts like Dr. Schenker think they should be. Their content is highly subjective. One glossy magazine advertisement features a policeman who was shot in the head and recovered after neurosurgery: “It’s a good thing New York’s finest was in the hand of New York’s finest,” it says. The hospital is generally ranked third in neurosurgery in New York.
