> The US is a global outlier on money spent on the drug, representing only 15 percent of the global insulin market and generating almost half of the pharmaceutical industry’s insulin revenue. According to a recent study in JAMA Internal Medicine, in the 1990s Medicaid paid between $2.36 and $4.43 per unit of insulin; by 2014, those prices more than tripled, depending on the formulation.
insulin can cost thousands of dollars per month and it is an indispensable drug. Big Pharma actually raised the prices of insulin in recent years by 50%. so all that extra compensation literally just goes to drug costs.
The whole point of this is that insulin is more expensive in the US than elsewhere. So maybe it isn't "cheap", the point is the price is being inflated due to many factors, including through monopoly tactics such as paying off competitors to not compete.
It's true for new drugs, but insuline price have been multiplied by 5 during the last decade (https://www.ontrackdiabetes.com/type-1-diabetes/insulin-pric...), which is a drug that should actually cost less to make, since we know it very well, and have a lot of demand now with the obesity epidemic.
A lot of people seem to be confused about insulin every time it comes up. There are many different forms of insulin. Regular human insulin has been around for decades and is fairly cheap without insurance but difficult/inconvenient to use because it requires planning out your eating schedule.
The extremely expensive insulin that articles are talking about is usually a brand name like Humalog which is an altered form of insulin that is far more convenient to use. It is possible (but rather convoluted) to bring these eye-popping prices down to $99/month without insurance (https://www.admelog.com/savings), or $43-73/vial (https://www.goodrx.com/insulin-lispro or Walmart Novolog). Of course, this is all basically a way for pharma companies to price discriminate to extract as much $$$ from insurance.
Insulin has actually gotten cheaper; it's the pricing due to customization, branding and applicators that is totally out of control. Coupled with the history of insulin's invention and "open source" nature this is unconscionable .
In most of the world people can get a month's supply of insulin for less than $100/ month. It's not more expensive to manufacture here, there is just more profit-taking.
You are missing the point. Every kind of insulin is more expensive in the US than _every_ other country. It's not just old stuff is "cheap", new stuff is expensive. It's old stuff is more expensive in the US, new stuff is more expensive in the US.
Average prices per "standard unit"
* Rapid acting: $120 (US) vs $13.50 (JP)
* Rapid-int (?) acting: $107(US) vs. $13 (JP)
* Short-acting: $87 (US) vs $19 (FR)
* Short-int acting: $95 (US) vs $13 (JP)
* Intermediate acting: $73 (US) vs $13 (JP)
* Long acting: $88 (US) vs $15 (JP)
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