Further Adventures in the Pharmaceutical Trade

As readers may recall, I am no fan of the pharmaceutical companies' tactics, which strike me as tantamount to the American funeral industry's, digging into your pocketbook when you're at your physical/emotional lowest. Notice, too, they both claim foundations of pure altruism, and if you've had delightful experiences with one or both, I'm delighted.

Here's my latest, a sort of trickle-down effect: I am having Lasik this week, and needed to fill a prescription for one Valium, which the doctor apparently has patients take an hour before the procedure, as well as for ten Vicodin, for any pain afterwards. I stopped at Walgreen's, because it was close to where I needed to grocery shop, and having only twenty dollars cash and a debit card, wanted to know which to use where, and asked the pharmacist what the 'scrips would run.

"The Valium will be $11.99," she said. I asked, for one pill?

"That's Walgreen's policy," she answered. "The lowest we charge for any presciption is $11.99."

Or, what she'd also charge for fourteen. I asked, if I'd come in with twenty separate presciptions for one pill each, they would have cost $11.99 per...

"Well, then we might have been able to make a deal."

I told her to hand me back my prescriptions. I contemplated reaming out the manager for upholding a policy designed to alienate and piss off customers; to make them feel low and helpless. And how about all the people who come in really sick, as I am not, and don't have the energy to go somewhere else, as I was about to? Does he care that they just sit there on the beat-up vinyl chairs, with expressions that say, "I know I'm going to take it up the ass, but be gentle because I already feel terrible"? But the managers I've seen in this store have looked beaten themselves, variously seething and laconic in their crappy corporate smocks.

I drove to my HMO (Kaiser); they filled both 'scrips for $20 bucks, perhaps not substantially less but not institutionally more. Also, the young pharmacist, an Asian kid in a cool cowboy shirt, was a doll.

For those doing good things and not for the dime: check out today's NY Times on Iraq blogger Michael Yon, whom I first learned of from my buddy Michael Totten.

Comments

[David]

next time call me. i'll post a valium posthaste.
and you probably won't have pain afterward. however, you could chip a little bit off the vicodin before the surgery and take that -- it'll be just like valium.

[nancy]

You're the second person since I've posted to say, "Need a valium? Call me, silly goose!" My friends...

[eric]

Good luck on the Lasik! I did it years ago, and it was the best money I ever spent. No pain whatsoever, the only annoying part was the fly-goggles you have to wear for a couple days at night so you don't rub your eyes. The whole procedure takes seconds. My eyesight is still 15/20.

[Antoine Clarke]

I would not necessarily advise getting Valium from a friend. The latest fad in fake drugs is to use STRONGER doses of the active ingredient, because its cheaper than scouting around for some rat poison, talcum powder or whatever. Which with mild painkillers is fine, but not for anything really powerful.
About the pricing, definitely shop around. Wal-Mart have had a $4 per month's supply for a selection of drugs for a year now, and some places even give the stuff away. If you pay about $1,000 to my boss you can read everything I've written about it. :-)
Some states actually ban stores from selling drugs below a minimum price because, you guess, its to protect the consumer. From what I ask myself, but hey, I'm the extremist.

[nancy]

Yay! That's what the doc says mine will be.
I told my husband, to go with the goggles I am going to buy a Creature of the Black Lagoon outfit to wear to bed. Hot!

[nancy]

I wonder, Antoine, if Wal-Mart -- which I know is now fabulously competitive when it comes to drugs -- would have charged me for one pill?

[Antoine Clarke]

To be fair, there are all sorts of problems with packaging regs and policies, partly because of tamper proof packaging, so I wouldn't be surprised if you couldn't buy one tablet. Having said that, I know I can get a pack of four aspirin at some pharmacies and over the counter in some shops. So while you probably won't find anyone but a compounding pharmacist willing to break open a box for you (and the FDA and the pharma boys are trying to close them all down), you might find something like a twin pack. The pharmacy has to have a reason to carry this inventory item so you might find a weird price like $10 for one and $4 for 20.
You could try on-line, but I'd seriously stick to the recognized brands (Wal-Mart, CVS, etc) and use a portal you've bought groceries from if possible. There was even a fake Chinese FDA web site with links to "authorized manufacturers" or "authorized medicines" last year. This in a country were they executed the former FDA chief for taking about $40,000 in bribes. And he pleaded guilty and gave back all the cash. The Clintons wouldn't last a month.