Argh.
March 24, 2008
Via CNN:
Prices for oral contraceptives, or birth control pills, are doubling and tripling at student health centers, the result of a complex change in the Medicaid rebate law that essentially ends an incentive for drug companies to provide deep discounts to colleges.
[...]
The change is the result of a chain reaction started by a 2005 deficit-reduction bill that focused on Medicaid, the main federal health insurance program for the poor. College health officials say they had little idea the bill would affect them.Before the change, pharmaceutical companies typically sold drugs at deep discounts to a range of health care providers, including colleges. With contraceptives, one motivation was attracting customers who would stay with their products for years.
Representative Sally Kern just got pwned
March 15, 2008
High school senior and son of Oklahoma City bombing victim writes a brilliant, scathing letter to Representative Sally Kerns, who claimed that gays were more of a threat than terrorists.
The full letter is at this link.
Generic drug update and advice for Zyrtec users
March 10, 2008
Drugs recently available as generic:
Fosamax
Zyrtec
The generic prescription version of Zyrtec is available, and it’s OTC (although we’ve only been able to get brand name Zyrtec-D in stock as an OTC). Brand name prescription Zyrtec and Zyrtec D aren’t being made at all in any forms (I noticed the OTC Zyrtec D is the same pills as the prescription version, just repackaged). This has been a huge pain because we have patients on liquid forms of the drug and we can’t get it in stock now as a generic or an OTC or anything. It’s also causing all kinds of insurance turmoil.
