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Price of the Epi-Pen

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Penham View Drop Down
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    Posted: October 22 2016 at 11:08am
Ok, I had heard the price of the Epi-Pen had gone up, but $548 REALLY??? This is ridiculous. AND the pharmacy has to get special approval from your insurance company to even fill the prescription. So waiting to see how much it is really going to cost? Mine had expired and it was time to get new ones. I was able to print off a $300 discount coupon from the company that makes it, which is quite a big discount. But why charge that much to begin with if you're just going to give a $300 discount?
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Technophobe Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: October 22 2016 at 2:41pm
Many times I have wished to be American.  You have great freedoms, an enormous country: with many different areas - each with their own customs and cultures to share, vast wildernesses to explore, great education and so many advantages over the rest of us.  

.........................................................................................  Then I see our national health service.  'Not brilliant or perfect (just look at our dentistry!! - or lack of it), but free at the point of need and amazingly brilliant in so many ways.  Making our life expectancy (admittedly boring life, no guns, few freedoms and 10 years behind in technology) longer and our pain controls more widely accessable.  Suddenly the deal does not seem so great on that side of the pond.

Knowing all that, the horrendous cost of something so vital still shocked me.  They are just adrenaline (epinephrine) and that has been produced for decades.  It can't cost more than a tiny fraction of that to manufacture after so many years of production.  What is wrong with your system??? !!!  (I am so disgusted I have lost control over my punctuation.)

My sympathy, Penham.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Penham Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: October 22 2016 at 5:14pm
In Europe there are other options, there are several different makers of the same type of medications like the EpiPen, so there is competition to keep prices down. Here in the US, the FDA has not approved any other companies to make similar drugs, although my doctor says there should be a generic available in the near future.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Technophobe Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: October 24 2016 at 3:17am
I just had a look at the prices for them here and £49. (about $60) was the first price listed.  Source:  http://www.treated.com/allergies/epipen?gclid=CJLR-MeY888CFUEaGwod6mMP8Q  and that was just the first one I looked at.

I find your point illustrated rather well on this article:  http://www.forbes.com/sites/emilywillingham/2016/08/21/why-did-mylan-hike-epipen-prices-400-because-they-could/#50cb9b4a477a and I am truly horrified at the extortion.  

This is however not my point, or at least only a very small part of it.  Here in Scotland it would cost you NOTHING and about £8 (apx. $10) in England*.  The majority of the cost would be absorbed by our health service and additionally, as they buy in bulk and so have some leverage, they would pay 1/8 per pen than the services your side of the pond do.  It saddens me that such a great country has such a crappy medical service.  Those are people I like who are being conned.



*- this is a standard perscription charge for everything, avoidable in cases of welfare payments.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (1) Thanks(1)   Quote Penham Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: November 07 2016 at 6:27pm
Well, I ended up getting my Epi-pen and I got it for FREE, yay. My ENT was the one that wrote the prescription and when I went to my regular doctor and I told her how much it was going to cost, she just laughed and said "don't pay it, I'll give you one for free" and she did.
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