Medicare drug benefit

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Government's medicare drug benefit program is an unmitigated disaster Mike Adams, the Health Ranger See article keywords and concepts

It's a simple system, but hardly anybody is willing to tell the truth about it, and this big Bush handout -- this medicare drug benefit program -- only really benefits the drug companies. It doesn't benefit the senior citizens, and it doesn't benefit the taxpayers who are footing the bill. It certainly doesn't benefit any honest, hardworking American whose income continues to dwindle under the assault of do-gooder government programs like this one. It really only benefits Big Pharma, and, of course, that was its purpose.

States sue the federal government over the Bush drug benefit program (commentary) Mike Adams, the Health Ranger See article keywords and concepts

REPPED: President Bush marketed his medicare drug benefit program as a popular handout that would put more prescription drugs in seniors' pockets and more money in State coffers. But as it turns out, the drug benefit promises were completely fabricated, just like "weapons of mass destruction." In reality, the federal drug program has turned into a national nightmare that has left hundreds of thousands of low-income seniors without prescriptions, and States actually owing the federal government hundreds of millions of dollars as payment for the fiasco.

Generation Rx: How Prescription Drugs are Altering American Lives, Minds, and Bodies Greg Critser See book keywords and concepts

In his first term, Bill Clinton picked up on the mood and began hinting at price controls on drugs and, perhaps, a medicare drug benefit — something big pharma hated because it brought with it the specter of even more hardball price negotiators. At Merck, the new pressure on price had arrived as a storm. Only a few years before, Merck, which had been touted as "the miracle company," was now, as Business Week pronounced, "showing its age." Raymond Gilmartin, the man the board eventually hired to slow the aging process, was in almost every way his predecessor's alter ego.

The Big Fix: How the Pharmaceutical Industry Rips Off American Consumers Katharine Greider See book keywords and concepts

Public Citizen combed through lobbying records submitted to the federal government during the 1999-2000 election cycle, a critical one for drug companies, with a medicare drug benefit up for grabs. What emerges from the group's extensive database is the portrait of a lobbying force 625 members strong—bigger than Congress itself.

But the industry's most intensive lobbying was aimed at influencing the outcome on Medicare. A medicare drug benefit could be enormously profitable for the drug industry—if it boosts volume without containing prices. In recent plans, Senate Democrats propose pumping roughly ^425 billion into prescription drugs tor Medicare over eight years, versus $310 billion over ten years for the House Republican plan. But there's a key difference in the way the plans are structured.

The drug industry's political exertions over the last few years, including political ads aimed at key congressional candidates, helped prepare the way for the narrow passage in the House in June 2002 of the GOP version of a medicare drug benefit. In a particularly bold display of industry insid-erism, pharmaceutical companies were among the top donors at a lavish GOP fund-raiser two days after the drug-benefit plan's unveiling—and two days before its passage.

The Truth About the Drug Companies: How They Deceive Us and What to Do About It Marcia Angell, M.D. See book keywords and concepts

Big pharma simply would not have permitted a medicare drug benefit that included price negotiations. Congress was willing to make a useless transfer of billions of extra dollars from taxpayers to the drug companies and pharmacy benefit managers rather than cross big pharma. The industry is cozy with both Republicans and Democrats and with both the White House and Congress. But most of its attentions are lavished on Republicans, and vice versa. The New York Times reported that in 1999, Jim Nicholson, then chairman of the Republican National Committee, wrote to Charles A.

Senior citizens are particularly angry, and they are unlikely to be placated for long by the medicare drug benefit, for reasons I discussed in the last chapter. More and more Americans, even whole towns, are buying their drugs in Canada, where they are much cheaper, and there is pressure on Congress to undo the industry-inspired law that made doing so illegal. Large insurers and state governments are pushing back against drug prices by insisting on steep discounts and using lists of preferred drugs (formularies).

Critical Condition: How Health Care in America Became Big Business Donald L. Barlett and James B. Steele See book keywords and concepts

This trend is likely to accelerate as the medicare drug benefit takes effect fully in 2006, and Congress refuses to abandon a legislative policy that makes American consumers pay the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs. BLAME IT ON BAD BREATH Today's prescription-drug ads on television owe their origins to a revolutionary change on Madison Avenue that occurred nearly a century ago.

Bitter Pills: Inside the Hazardous World of Legal Drugs Stephen Fried See book keywords and concepts

If we had expanded the medicare drug benefit [as the plan proposed], there would have been a lot more drugs being sold. They should have understood they were going to be a target, take it in stride and look to the long run." s i trntiN rKitu To put the administration's decisions into perspective, this aide explained a little bit about how Clinton viewed the political clout of the drug companies. "There were not huge drug company contributions to the Democratic Party," he said. "I don't think there were any at all.

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ABOUT THE CREATOR OF NATURALPEDIA: Mike Adams, the creator of this NaturalNews Naturalpedia, is the editor of NaturalNews.com, the internet's top natural health news site, creator of the Honest Food Guide (www.HonestFoodGuide.org), a free downloadable consumer food guide based on natural health principles, author of Grocery Warning, The 7 Laws of Nutrition, Natural Health Solutions, and many other books available at www.TruthPublishing.com, creator of the earth-friendly EcoLEDs company (www.EcoLEDs.com) that manufactures energy-efficient LED lighting products, founder of Arial Software (www.ArialSoftware.com), a permission e-mail technology company, creator of the CounterThink Cartoon series (www.NaturalNews.com/index-cartoons.html) and author of over 1,500 articles, interviews, special reports and reference guides available at www.NaturalNews.com. Adams' personal philosophy and health statistics are available at www.HealthRanger.org.