OT: Abuterol inhaler

If you haven't check prices at Costco and Sam's club. My understanding is you don't have to be a member to use the pharmacy. My bp meds were $30 for 30 at Long's Pharmacy. $6 for 30 at Costco. Karl

Tom Gardner (nospam) wrote:

I wish there was a way to figure out the direct cost vs benefit of governmental regulations.

I noticed my dentist had remodeled his reception area due to hippa privacy rules.

Wes S

You're my HERO!!! According to Pricescan.com, Costco's cost is $6.23 each in lot of 3. I guess I'll be joining!

Soooo - the logic here is that the Tree Huggers have forced an impost on your usual supplier, but Costco have decided, in the interest of the consumer, to absorb the extra cost?.....

Both of the above sound bullshit - maybe your original supplier just wanted to make more money, and blaming the Tree Huggers is not likely to be questioned...given that they can be (and are) blamed for EVERYTHING....

Andrew VK3BFA.

Tom, you should shop around. The CFC-powered albuterol inhalers aren't going to be outlawed until the end of 2008, IIRC. Somebody may be playing the gas-station game on you, where they raise prices as soon as they hear crude oil prices are going up.

-- Ed Huntress

I'm not a fan of wally-world but most of my wife's medications now can now be had for $4.00 a pop. Don't know if this applies to ya and your milage may vary. :-) I figure it's just another way to drive out the competition but it's a lot easier to swallow that pill when it costs less then a third of what the small guy charges.

On Fri, 5 Jan 2007 16:06:51 -0500, with neither quill nor qualm, "Tom Gardner" quickly quoth:

They should have read Bailey first. :( BUT, chances are that the company just used that as an excuse to up the prices. A propellant should have been quite inexpensive compared to the drug dispensed.

Dad used that in his li'l plug-in percolator half a decade ago. What are those called...um, nebulizer. Those weren't cheap, either, but they also weren't portable.

G'luck.

If the cost was due to the propellent, then Serevent (Albuterol Sulfate) in the powdered "discus inhaler" form should be cheaper.

Anyone want to place a wager?

Perhaps Ed can provide insight into the process of setting the price of a drug.

Kevin Gallimore

I guess it depends on what you think about the Freon story and what you believe about this "Ozone Hole". CLUE: "Follow the money".

I actually learned about it in a segment on CNN. My brother-in-law a pharmacist said that they sell the drugs under cost because they figure they can make money off you while you're shopping waiting for the prescription to be filled. Glad it helped. Karl

Tom Gardner (nospam) wrote:

mm, yes - which story do you mean? - the one that claims that the whole thing is concocted , because the patents on FREON have run out so the chemical companies needed to get a substitute to market by running a scare campaign?

Or the story that CFC's deplete ozone, (Hint:- look up a first year chemistry textbook) and so cause all sorts of nasty things....(another hint:-doesn't matter if you live in the USA, the hole in the ozone layer hasn't reached you yet...)

And I miss FREON - a wonderful cleaner, the new stuff isnt nearly as good......

Andrew VK3BFA.

Wouldn't it be simpler/cheaper just to use the non CFC inhalers?

Mark Rand RTFM

Oops, just did a little reading. So Tom and co are being caught by the manufacturers being able to register/patent new formulations that are essentially identical to the old ones apart from propellant. Thus there are no generics with non CFC propellants available.

Bollocks! This is due to commercial factors and (possibly) the FDA getting in the way of things. Name brand Salbutamol CFC free inhalers don't have to cost $40:-

Mark Rand

Just like combining two existing medications into one pill, inhaler, whathaveyou, and marketing them as new, at new drug prices.

You got that absolutely right! :)

It's over my head, Kevin. We have pharma marketing guys on staff who track prices, and they've told me that it's a combination of things that set prices at the wholesale level. And it's a whole other issue at the retail level.

Maybe in a year or two I'll know more about it.

As for albuterol inhalers, they're considered primarily a "rescue" treatment these days, but some people use it in nebulizers on a regular routine, as well as the portable inhalers. It's still probably the most common quick-acting bronchodilator. A lot of hospitals and nursing homes use it because it's generic and very cheap. But it raises pulse rate, and can cause fungus growths in your mouth (a white film), and a few other things. So a bunch of alternatives have come along for scheduled treatment (several of which I've worked on over the last two years, in terms of patient education and marketing).

If you don't have to use it every day, it's still probably the first choice of most doctors.

-- Ed Huntress

There are two brands of non-CFC albuterol inhalers available in the US now, and their price runs 5 - 10 times as much as the generic CFC inhalers. The FDA says they expect those prices to come down, but they're noncommital about it.

I don't know why the prices are so high. They may have patents, but I'm not sure.

-- Ed Huntress

Now you're seeing the unique character of the US pharma business. We're the only developed country that has no price control on drugs. So patents are most of the game. If you have a patent and if you have an essential drug, you can charge almost as much as you want.

That's how the US consumer finances the development of new drugs for the rest of the world. I'm not kidding about that: that's exactly how it works. It's also why the Dems and the Repubs have been at each others' throats over negotiating prices for Medicare recipients. The Republicans are in deep with Big Pharma, and they don't want to threaten their "free market" operations.

But Big Pharma is moving its chips over to the Democrats right now in a big way. We'll see what happens.

-- Ed Huntress