Brave New Films Hits The Healthcare Industry Hard

In theory, they should be alleviating suffering, which is a laudable thing; and if they could profit from that, it would be fine. In practice, they are doing such an inferior job that America, once a leading nation in providing health care to its citizens, is now behind dozens of other nations. This inclines me to think that the people in power within this industry while that happened are incompetent.

America has the best health care in the world for the wealthy. Even people who are insured frequently find, at the worst possible time, that their policy does not cover what they thought it did -- or that it should, but the company refuses and refuses to pay what it owes.

You are certainly right that it needs to be spread around more.

Obama doesn't have a plan. (I think that was a mistake.) Congress has several plans under consideration. At least one of them bans negotiation. That offends me; I'm very much against creating a captive audience. The health care industry is doing a great job of boobytrapping the plans so they will fail. And the same people who are saying that government-run health care would be bad due to lack of competition are also doing everything they can to destroy competition for the reigning companies.

Name-calling is unfair, I agree.

Modern health care requires safe, effective, and affordable drugs. Medication that, for whatever reason, fails to reach people who need it is no more useful than medication that doesn't exist. I understand that someone needs to produce the drugs we use. But I am deeply, bitterly dissatisfied with the overall performance of American companies in this regard. When I look at other countries that are getting better health care for less money, that makes me feel angry and envious. I want everyone to have access to good, affordable health care and a job that makes enough money to live on. When I see a mess like America today, I want to change it, and I think there are many things about the drug companies that need to be changed. As a consumer, I do not feel that they are adequately meeting my needs or the needs of other people in America.

>>This is not about American companies - the same multinational pharma companies (Pfizer, J&J, Novartis, Lilly, Roche etc.,) are charging lots of money in the US, and a lot less in France, Canada and Australia.<<

Then they are simply ripping people off because they can, and that makes me even angrier.

>>You can take it too far; in Canada, Australia and New Zealand, the pricing and reimbursement rules are so tough that pharma companies sometimes decide not to launch their products there, and the people of those countries are deprived of the newest and best products.<<

I don't think that's right either. I think that prices should be fair all around, so that people can get what they need.

>>Obama absolutely should look into drug pricing.<<

I wish that would happen. Unfortunately, drug companies are spending millions of dollars on advertising (much of it dishonest) and, frankly, bribes to block attempts at anything that might bring down the prices of prescription drugs in America.

Clearly it is possible to make and sell drugs at a reasonable price through an effective system. Other countries have found ways of achieving this. So should we.

I suspect the idea was that American drug prices are grossly overinflated, somewhere along the line, compared to drug prices in civilized nations.