HP 609 Week 6 Assignment 1: Health Policy Event

HP 609 Week 6 Assignment 1: Health Policy Event

Summary

Today’s discussion covered drug prices in the United States (U.S) and why these prices keep going up. The participants in this forum discussed a lot of information regarding why drug prices are high, from existing drug payers that exist, such as Medicare & Medicaid which are government payers and private payers, to comparing drug costs in the U.S versus other developed countries. Trump’s blueprints were also mentioned and how only a few people had seen or even read them. Another aspect of this discussion was how the high prices were in fact impacting the consumers, of which it was noted that consumers are sheltered from the actual costs, therefore, they never quite know how expensive their drugs are.  It was also pointed out that most physicians are clueless on the cost of the medications they prescribe. Factors that were leading to high prices were mentioned to be lack of competition, the generic drugs being prescribed more and yet there are drugs that are still expensive among many other factors, drugs not having substitution too drove the prices high.

Analysis

In today’s economy, people are having to choose between buying groceries, paying their bills and paying for their medications. High drug costs are not a new thing that just happened, drug prices have been spiking for a while now, however, when certain medications prices become unreasonable, then it is time to act. It was noted in a survey that it was not until the price of the Daraprim went up to 750 dollars (Hyman and Silver, 2019) that it was time for action. People are taking to rationing their medication due to affordability issues and the ends results are not good. People’s conditions are worsening as a result of this. Working toward solving the drug price problem has a lot to put into action, and this would take a while. Steps such as patent use, right diagnosis and treatment, allowing Medicare to negotiate with drug companies and free health care for all.

If the government initiates the patent use, it gives them the upper hand at stopping the monopoly that pharmaceuticals have been conducting. This would enable for multiple contractors to produce the same product even without the patent holder’s approval. This in turn leads to ease accessibility and availability of the same drug at a much cheaper price. Right diagnosis and treatment would also help patients not to spend money on unnecessary medication. Many a time a patient is given the wrong diagnosis and treated for that illness for a while before the error in diagnosis is finally realized. However, by this time the patient has already spent thousands of dollars on drugs that should not have been prescribed to begin with. Therefore, providers should look at results twice and critically before diagnosing patients, hence saving costs on treatment.

Having the Bipartisan Budget Act (H.R 1892) activated would also save the drug prices to an extent that manufacturers will not be increasing prices (Waxman et al, 2020) each time they have a slight change in the formulary. Companies developed a tendency to increase prices each time they made any chances to the formulary. This increase in prices always catches unaware especially if they really need that drug hence having to keep up with the prescription regardless of the price. Additionally, this Act would also help with closing the Medicare part D gap and increasing manufacturer drug cost liability (Waxman et al., 2020). The patients will still be expected to pay a fee for their prescriptions, but their coverage benefits will not be affected at the end of the year.

Free healthcare for all is another solution to consider. The U.S is a developed and wealthy country, whose population pays taxes. Using these taxes, the U.S can emulate other developed countries like Canada, Germany’s health care systems where all their people have

coverage and do the same for the American people. Then give people the choose to provide themselves with private coverage if they want to. This would give more chance for treatment for patients with chronic diseases like Diabetes. Over 9 percent of the people is diagnosed with Diabetes (Nguyen & Mui, 2020) and most often they need their medication like insulin to survive. However, knowing that insulin costs around 160 dollars a year for non-insulin patients and 512 dollars for insulin dependent patients (Nguyen & Mui, 2020) can be very costly for patients to afford. Having everyone covered through the same insurance would ensure treatment for all with no stress to the patients.

Important information for writing discussion questions and participation

Welcome to class

Hello class and welcome to the class and I will be your instructor for this course. This is a -week course and requires a lot of time commitment, organization, and a high level of dedication. Please use the class syllabus to guide you through all the assignments required for the course. I have also attached the classroom policies to this announcement to know your expectations for this course. Please review this document carefully and ask me any questions if you do. You could email me at any time or send me a message via the “message” icon in halo if you need to contact me. I check my email regularly, so you should get a response within 24 hours. If you have not heard from me within 24 hours and need to contact me urgently, please send a follow up text to

I strongly encourage that you do not wait until the very last minute to complete your assignments. Your assignments in weeks 4 and 5 require early planning as you would need to present a teaching plan and interview a community health provider. I advise you look at the requirements for these assignments at the beginning of the course and plan accordingly. I have posted the YouTube link that explains all the class assignments in detail. It is required that you watch this 32-minute video as the assignments from week 3 through 5 require that you follow the instructions to the letter to succeed. Failure to complete these assignments according to instructions might lead to a zero. After watching the video, please schedule a one-on-one with me to discuss your topic for your project by the second week of class. Use this link to schedule a 15-minute session. Please, call me at the time of your appointment on my number. Please note that I will NOT call you.

Please, be advised I do NOT accept any assignments by email. If you are having technical issues with uploading an assignment, contact the technical department and inform me of the issue. If you have any issues that would prevent you from getting your assignments to me by the deadline, please inform me to request a possible extension. Note that working fulltime or overtime is no excuse for late assignments. There is a 5%-point deduction for every day your assignment is late. This only applies to approved extensions. Late assignments will not be accepted.

If you think you would be needing accommodations due to any reasons, please contact the appropriate department to request accommodations.

Plagiarism is highly prohibited. Please ensure you are citing your sources correctly using APA 7th edition. All assignments including discussion posts should be formatted in APA with the appropriate spacing, font, margin, and indents. Any papers not well formatted would be returned back to you, hence, I advise you review APA formatting style. I have attached a sample paper in APA format and will also post sample discussion responses in subsequent announcements.

Your initial discussion post should be a minimum of 200 words and response posts should be a minimum of 150 words. Be advised that I grade based on quality and not necessarily the number of words you post. A minimum of TWO references should be used for your initial post. For your response post, you do not need references as personal experiences would count as response posts. If you however cite anything from the literature for your response post, it is required that you cite your reference. You should include a minimum of THREE references for papers in this course. Please note that references should be no more than 5 years old except recommended as a resource for the class. Furthermore, for each discussion board question, you need ONE initial substantive response and TWO substantive responses to either your classmates or your instructor for a total of THREE responses. There are TWO discussion questions each week, hence, you need a total minimum of SIX discussion posts for each week. I usually post a discussion question each week. You could also respond to these as it would count towards your required SIX discussion posts for the week.

I understand this is a lot of information to cover in 5 weeks, however, the Bible says in Philippians 4:13 that we can do all things through Christ that strengthens us. Even in times like this, we are encouraged by God’s word that we have that ability in us to succeed with His strength. I pray that each and every one of you receives strength for this course and life generally as we navigate through this pandemic that is shaking our world today. Relax and enjoy the course!

Hi Class,

Please read through the following information on writing a Discussion question response and participation posts.

Contact me if you have any questions.

Important information on Writing a Discussion Question

• Your response needs to be a minimum of 150 words (not including your list of references)
• There needs to be at least TWO references with ONE being a peer reviewed professional journal article.
• Include in-text citations in your response
• Do not include quotes—instead summarize and paraphrase the information
• Follow APA-7th edition
• Points will be deducted if the above is not followed

Participation –replies to your classmates or instructor

• A minimum of 6 responses per week, on at least 3 days of the week.
• Each response needs at least ONE reference with citations—best if it is a peer reviewed journal article
• Each response needs to be at least 75 words in length (does not include your list of references)
• Responses need to be substantive by bringing information to the discussion or further enhance the discussion. Responses of “I agree” or “great post” does not count for the word count.
• Follow APA 7th edition
• Points will be deducted if the above is not followed

• Remember to use and follow APA-7th edition for all weekly assignments, discussion questions, and participation points.
• Here are some helpful links
• The is a great resource

References

Hyman, D. A., & Silver, C. (2019). Why are we Being Overcharged for Pharmaceuticals? What Should We Do About It? Journal of Legal Medicine, 39(2), 137–149.

Nguyen, A., & Mui, K. (2020, April). The Staggering True Cost of Diabetes – GoodRx. Goodrx. https://www.goodrx.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/Diabetes-Cost-White-Paper.pdf.

U.S. Drug Prices. The Forum at Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health. (2018, November 27). https://theforum.sph.harvard.edu/events/u-s-drug-prices/.

Waxman, H. A., Corr, B., Sharp, J., McDonald, R., & Kenyatta, K. (2020, October). Getting to Lower Prescription Drug Prices. commonwealth fund. https://www.commonwealthfund.org/sites/default/files/2020-10/Waxman_GettingtoLowerRxPrices_report_v3.pdf.