[Erakad]

Many reasons for high health costs, but number one on my list is the cost of drugs. I work for a large "HMO-like" healthcare organizations. In our region are 13 facilities ranging from small clinics seeing around 20K patients a year to medical centers seeing hundreds of thousands. Universally, they can control facility, maintenance, payroll, etc, but across the board each facility is over executing their pharmacy budget, or barely hanging on. The home office bails them out, but this is becoming increasingly difficult. The question is why does the pharmaceutical industry demand these prices...the reason they get away with it is obvious (cure, physician marketing, etc). But as just "another" consumer looking in, I'm mystified how they REALLY get away with it. I understand research....ok, they deserve to make a profit based on the risk bringing the product to market, and I understand that some of that profit is making up for lost time while the FDA holds your drug in approval pergatory....but come on, every other industry can make a profit without overtly gouging the consumer. Case in point. Name brand retroviral drugs (HIV) can cost a consumer $5K or more every year, but poor nations are making their unlicensed versions for their citizens for cents on the dollar (ref todays paper). If you want our presidential candidates to start controlling health costs, how about controlling this industry......instead of offering retirees discounts.