…under the marvelous new Medicare program?
The pharmaceutical industry is beginning to reap a windfall from a surprisingly lucrative niche market: drugs for poor people.
And analysts expect the benefits to show up in many of the quarterly financial results that drug makers will begin posting this week.
The windfall, which by some estimates could be $2 billion or more this year, is a result of the transfer of millions of low-income people into the new Medicare Part D drug program that went into effect in January. Under that program, as it turns out, the prices paid by insurers, and eventually the taxpayer, for the medications given to those transferred are likely to be higher than what was paid under the federal-state Medicaid programs for the poor.
A Windfall From Shifts to Medicare (New York Times)
Don’t worry–they won’t run out of people to drug, because everyone’s gonna get screened for potential drugalicious mental illnesses!
Quality screening and early intervention will occur in both readily accessible, low-stigma settings, such as primary health care facilities and schools, and in settings in which a high level of risk exists for mental health problems, such as criminal justice, juvenile justice, and child welfare systems. Both children and adults will be screened for mental illnesses during their routine physical exams.
Final Report to the President (New Freedom Commission on Mental Health)
Peachy! And I’m glad to see that the pharmaceutical industry got their money’s worth!
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