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There has been a lot of talk during this health care debate about bending the cost curve. Unfortunately, for the most part, that is all it has been, talk. Byron Dorgan (D-ND) is different. He actually has an idea to bend the cost curve on our health care spending. This idea is a bipartisan amendment to allow drug re-importation.
In all the other industrialized countries, they pay a faction of what we do for the same prescription drugs. On average, they spend about half as much per person on drugs. Part of the reason that other countries pay so much less for prescription drugs is due to the fact that their governments help to negotiate the best drug prices for their citizens. The other reason is that they have a parallel trade system in which people in one European country can buy their drugs cheaper from other European countries. Dorgan’s amendment would give the American people this same power to buy these identical, cheaper prescription drugs from other first-world countries.
Dorgan’s bipartisan amendment has been scored by the CBO as saving the federal government $19.4 billion, and American consumers roughly $100 billion over the next decade. (Personally I think the CBO has dramatically underestimated the potential savings from this amendment. I would not be surprised if eventually it saved the American people four to six times as much, but that is a story for another day.)
This projected $100 billion in savings translates to roughly $33 per person per year for every individual in this country. This is how you really bend the cost curve. You do it with a series of small changes that save everyone some money. You do it by adopting dozens of proven ideas that are currently successfully being used in other countries to keep their health care costs so much lower than ours. Of course, Dorgan’s bipartisan, cost-bending amendment (which Barack Obama co-sponsored when he was in the Senate) might not make it into the final bill because it violates Obama’s secret deal with PhRMA. With Obama now fighting against one of the only proven cost-saving ideas offered in this health care reform battle, it makes you wonder how much reform was about bending the cost curve, and how much it was about gaining favor from the big campaign donating industrial lobbies at the expense of regular working class Americans.
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Not me, Jon, about the only thing I’m wondering is why media has given Obama a free ride on this. He alone should be held accountable for the HealthCare Bill he signs because everyone KNOWS how corrupt Congress is. No one KNEW how corrupt Obama was.
Talk about taking to the streets…this one issue effects almost every person and family. So little coverage about this whole topic.
Having FDA release this letter on the eve of the drug reimportation vote is a low blow.
It is consistent with Obama’s leak about triggers on the eve of the House public option vote.
When Obama wants something he plays hardball. Problem is, what he wants and what we want are two different things. I’m really starting to dislike this man.
Jon, You’ve hit this one out of the park! How about leading with it everyday until a HealthCare Bill is passed?
“With Obama now fighting against one of the only proven cost-saving ideas offered in this health care reform battle, it makes you wonder how much reform was about bending the cost curve, and how much it was about gaining favor from the big campaign donating industrial lobbies at the expense of regular working class Americans.”
It’s a sign of our times that misdirection plays (abortion, Gov’t. takeovers, killing Grandma) have received so much attention while the clearest & simplest measures to effect real & dramatic change have been TOTALLY ignored.
So, where’s Jane? Where’s your reader outrage? I wish months ago you’d made this the site’s principal cause! Of course there’s more to be done, but surely ANY Bill that fails to address this single opportunity is a sham and should be voted DOWN.
We will never gain control of Congress as long as we let them not only gerrymander their districts, but also accept money and favors from corporations. Politicians need to be put on the Pratt&Whitney buyer’s rules:
No gifts whatsoever, with the exception of pens and pads of paper with corp logos on.
It’s the issue that is the crux of every argument. We’ll never be able to elect them as quickly as the corporations can buy them.
It’s the ONLY issue that has the leverage to give us our government back, but nobody ever mentions it.
They may not want to do it, but if we could force them, it would open up our govt in ways that are all positive – one example: Rather than working for two weeks and then hitting the campaign contribution circuit… they would be able to spend each and every day in office working for their constituents, because they would all be using public funds. It would shorten the campaign season, since the gobs of corporate dollars would be gone.
If there’s one cause that we should never let up on, it’s public money for campaigns along with voting by county.
We’re screwed until and unless we get this.