Support NeoGAF

[ScatheZombie]

Yeah, I'm sure these companies being told what they're allowed to charge for a product (and in the process cutting their profit margins to shreds) - would be great news to them.

That's not how it will actually work. The number of companies that make mega-bucks by jacking up prices on existing patented medicines is incredibly small. The rest of the pharma industry wants them gone just as much as we do. Because everyone else is investing millions of dollars into R&D to make new drugs and charge mega-bucks for them. These other companies are weaseling their way into existing patents and exploiting the system.

In all likelihood, big pharma would actually support this type of legislation. Especially international pharma companies who may end up having an easier time importing their products from EU to the US market.

She can be a corporate shill and still pass legislation that helps us normal folks out at the same time - as long as it ultimately helps both sides - which this seemingly does.

 

[JustenP88]

Except one of the biggest causes she's fought for over the years is children's healthcare. We have a record of her on issues like this and it's very good. People just ignore it, for reasons.

So what? People are absolutely right to "follow the money". Does she work on children's Healthcare issues so people will he nice to her on the Internet, or because it's the right thing to do?

I don't think she needs to be coddled as much as most here seem to.

 

[thepotatoman]

Prohibit “pay for delay” arrangements that keep generic competition off the market. Hillary Clinton would prohibit “pay for delay” agreements that allow drug manufacturers to keep generic competition off of the market – lowering prices for Americans, and saving the government up to $10 billion.

Allow Medicare to negotiate drug and biologic prices and demand higher rebates for prescription drugs in Medicare. Hillary Clinton has long believed that Medicare should use its leverage with more than 40 million enrollees to negotiate and drive down drug and biologic prices for seniors and others in the program. Today, drug prices in Medicare are negotiated by a disparate set of benefit managers, rather than using the full bargaining power of the program. Clinton believes that we should drive the best bargain for Americans, especially for senior citizens, by allowing Medicare to negotiate drug prices, notably for high-cost drugs with limited competition. Hillary Clinton would also require pharmaceutical companies to provide higher rebates in the Medicare low-income subsidy program, ensuring that rebates are at Medicaid levels. This would save more than $100 billion in Medicare costs.

Stop direct-to-consumer drug company advertising subsidies, and reinvest funds in research. Almost every country in the industrialized world bans or severely restricts direct-to-consumer advertising because it increases prescription drug costs, and can include confusing, misleading or incomplete information or exaggerated claims if not regulated effectively. Clinton’s plan would eliminate corporate write-offs for direct-to-consumer advertising, saving the government billions of dollars over the next decade. She would use the proceeds to help invest in research and making new treatments available. And going forward, Clinton’s plan would establish a mandatory FDA pre-clearance procedure for these ads, funded through user-fees paid for by pharmaceutical manufacturers in order to be sure that the ads provide clear and understandable information to consumers.

Wait, it's legal to pay competitors to delay their products? How is that not an illegal monopolistic practice in any industry, none the less for something as important as the medical industry. It certainly seems like a good idea to crack down on that.

It's also nice to see she's at least promoting government negotiation, even though I sadly doubt it can or will be done.

Only thing that bugs me is when they speak so strongly against direct to consumer drug advertising, while coming up with such a weak policy to address it. Why not just undo Bill Clinton's FDA's requirements that spawned the whole direct to consumer advertising thing? You don't even need Congress's approval to do it, just have the damn FDA require the same amount of information to go alongside ads that they had before Bill Clinton's presidency, and most of the ads go away with that.

Everything else seems fine, though it requires a lot of trust in whoever she or future presidents put in charge to oversee all that.

 

[benjipwns]

Benji pls

Her "specific policy" is to create an opposing entity of some kind to the FDA and essentially ask it to design a way to work with the FDA that will have the FDA stop being the FDA and allow everything the FDA is institutionally designed and geared towards stopping.

Wait, it's legal to pay competitors to delay their products? How is that not an illegal monopolistic practice in any industry, none the less for something as important as the medical industry. It certainly seems like a good idea to crack down on that.

That was the bill Mylan spent millions lobbying against.

It's not monopolistic because the FDA has to approve each and every different use for a generic. As long as the patent holder still claims a patent they can't approve a generic.

 

[Maxim726X]

Reading over some of the responses in this thread, let's be real, there's very little nuance here. There's a lot of "she took money, we can't trust her," and that ain't nuance.

Nuance would be looking at old actions in conjunction with the taking of money and deciding from there. But we can both see that ain't happening.

There are just as many posts deriding criticisms of her connections with big money as there are those claiming that she is a corporate puppet. What I don't see, is people acknowledging that there is reason to believe that this proposal could go either way.

Or, more importantly, if any of these plans can even be enacted in this political climate.

 

[thepotatoman]

That was the bill Mylan spent millions lobbying against.

It's not monopolistic because the FDA has to approve each and every different use for a generic. As long as the patent holder still claims a patent they can't approve a generic.

If the patent holder had that much power, they wouldn't need to be paying hundreds of millions of dollars to get the companies to stop challenging those patents.

 

[Aaron Strife]

So what? People are absolutely right to "follow the money". Does she work on children's Healthcare issues so people will he nice to her on the Internet, or because it's the right thing to do?

I don't think she needs to be coddled as much as most here seem to.

Considering much of her healthcare work occurred in the early to mid 90s, I'm guessing how people would react on the Internet played a pretty small part in her thinking.

 

[xxracerxx]

Does she work on children's Healthcare issues so people will he nice to her on the Internet, or because it's the right thing to do?

So her crusading for healthcare reform for over 20 years is just an optics issue for her?

 

[JustenP88]

Considering much of her healthcare work occurred in the early to mid 90s, I'm guessing how people would react on the Internet played a pretty small part in her thinking.

I don't disagree.

So her crusading for healthcare reform for over 20 years is just an optics issue for her?

Probably not. It just doesn't exempt her from skepticism re: money in politics. I don't like people only caring about this issue as long as it's convenient to them.

 

[AbsolutBro]

She’ll start by convening representatives of Federal agencies charged with ensuring health and safety, as well as fair competition, to create a dedicated group charged with protecting consumers from outlier price increases.

Fucking god damnit! WE ALREADY EXIST! I know we're a small agency, but the FTC EXISTS TO DO THIS! We already had this problem once and the result was the goddam mess that is the CFPB. I work in the goddamn BUREAU OF CONSUMER PROTECTION. We have a DIVISION OF FINANCIAL PRACTICES. Seriously. Surely ONE person on her staff could have done a smidgen of research.

Their jurisdiction is only the financial sector.

And they can't even figure that one out, it'd be hilarious seeing them turf war with the FDA.

The CFPB is a mess, but yeah, this falls outside their area. And they would lose a turf war with the FDA very quickly.

A lot actually, this falls under antitrust rulings.

No competition assumes a monopoly.

Well, not really. Patent laws are a strange area that exists outside of antitrust/monopoly laws because technically nothing is stopping someone from creating their own version of the device in question (e.g.: the EpiPen). In actual practice, the money involved to develop something like that and get testing authority and all that makes it extremely difficult, costly and time consuming.

Xerox is a pretty great example of patent vs monopoly.

If the patent holder had that much power, they wouldn't need to be paying hundreds of millions of dollars to get the companies to stop challenging those patents.

Well, the idea is that the "hundreds of millions" they spend is still less than the billions in profit that they make from being the only source of a particular good.

I mean, I don't like these situations very much. I have long argued that the government being the largest single insurer in the country via Medicare/Medicaid should be using that for leverage. Then again, I ALSO think the government should be hiring at least a dozen new investigators to go after medicare/medicaid fraud, so I may be biased.

 

[thepotatoman]

Well, the idea is that the "hundreds of millions" they spend is still less than the billions in profit that they make from being the only source of a particular good.

I mean, I don't like these situations very much. I have long argued that the government being the largest single insurer in the country via Medicare/Medicaid should be using that for leverage. Then again, I ALSO think the government should be hiring at least a dozen new investigators to go after medicare/medicaid fraud, so I may be biased.

Most of those government benefit fraud investigators tend to cost more in salaries than they save from the people they catch, but if you want to do it for the principle of it or to maybe scare people out of trying it, sure.

 

[Morrigan Stark]

Shkreli wept.

Relevant:

(Context here https://twitter.com/MartinShkreli/status/769382112411648000 )

 

[exmachina64]

If the Republicans weren't obstructing everything, I'd suggest just creating price controls set through a new or existing agency.

 

[AbsolutBro]

Most of those government benefit fraud investigators tend to cost more in salaries than they save from the people they catch, but if you want to do it for the principle of it or to maybe scare people out of trying it, sure.

No, not even close.

 

[Nafai1123]

I don't disagree.



Probably not. It just doesn't exempt her from skepticism re: money in politics. I don't like people only caring about this issue as long as it's convenient to them.

She was shit on mercilessly during her husbands presidency for doing this. It wasn't convenient for her, in fact it was the complete opposite.

It's not hard to do your research on her and find that much of her political career she's fought against the grain in an effort to make ACTUAL change in the world. That is not convenient, it's hurt her politically, but she did it anyways.

 

[excelsiorlef]

Hillary announces policy plan. Addresses issues.

Usual Suspects: She's lying, I don't believe her.

*Next day*

Usual Suspects: How come Clinton and HilGaf never talk about her policies...

 

[Mrbob]

Will be interesting to see how this unfolds.

How do you even regulate this issue?

Drug X up 300% is bad, drug Y up 250% its ok, drug Z up 325% and thats ok.

To be clear I'm in favor of a cap but I want to see how its implemented. If anything big pharma now are going to charge max price on day one instead of steady increases. We end up losing anyway.

 

[Staccat0]

Don't count on it. She took more money from pharmaceutical companies than every Republican candidate combined.

So now what? They gonna put a hit out on her?

 

[Alucrid]

Hillary announces policy plan. Addresses issues.

Usual Suspects: She's lying, I don't believe her.

*Next day*

Usual Suspects: How come Clinton and HilGaf never talk about her policies...

i don't believe you

 

[User 463088]

Hillary announces policy plan. Addresses issues.

Usual Suspects: She's lying, I don't believe her.

*Next day*

Usual Suspects: How come Clinton and HilGaf never talk about her policies...

 

[ezrarh]

Can't we just do whatever Mexico is doing?

 

[Lord Frieza]

Hillary puts out detailed plans explaining her policies; everyone says she won't really do it and list a bunch of unrelated reasons why; media doesn't even bother talking about it.

Trump gives vague ideas about what he'll do while flip flopping on them several times a day depending on who he's talking to; everyone says the details don't matter and his advisors will work it all out; media spends the entire news cycle talking about it

I hate this election

Always the answer is always.

Uh, what? Because that is not what is happening with Trump and his 'policies' at all right now. Pretty much everyone has been critical of Trump's lack of real policy and has constantly pushed both him and his aides to get more detail, which they almost always reflect into a 'But what about Hillary' spill. Unless you're only source of news is Hannity, I really don't know how you can take away that from the current coverage of Trump's campaign

 

[Steel]

Don't count on it. She took more money from pharmaceutical companies than every Republican candidate combined.

I wouldn't count on it simply because of the republican congress, but this reasoning is silly.

 

[Condom]

So they're not going to tell the pharmaceutical companies what their prices should be, then fine them or otherwise punish them when when they think that they've raised them too far? Yeah, that's not going to let well-connected corporations evade punishment and hinder their competition AT ALL.

If you're going to start fining people for price gouging, just go all the damn way and start using price controls. It's not like we've had anything close to a free and competitive market in health care for a century.

Great news about reciprocation and legalized imports from EU countries, though.

Sums up my opinion of this. Little bit weak on the policy part of the announcement but on the bright side it's good that there at least is some attention for this issue.

 

[Nickle]

Hildog doesn't take money for political favors, she's one of the good ones. #notallpoliticians

 

[Macam]

Aside from the fact this is just digital ink with no chance of becoming enacted, it's not even a good plan.

 

[JustenP88]

She was shit on mercilessly during her husbands presidency for doing this. It wasn't convenient for her, in fact it was the complete opposite.

It's not hard to do your research on her and find that much of her political career she's fought against the grain in an effort to make ACTUAL change in the world. That is not convenient, it's hurt her politically, but she did it anyways.

Jesus Christ.

Fuck it. Yaaaas queen or whatever.

 

[Fat4all]

Jesus Christ.

Fuck it. Yaaaas queen or whatever.

good debate

 

[Riddick]

Clinton publishes a non-specific PR "plan" against the greedy behaviour of some of her biggest donors. Well, that will certainly be a huge success.

That's EXACTLY how it works.

 

[JustenP88]

That's EXACTLY how it works.

Nah, that's how it works as far as Republicans are concerned. We're totally cool over here though.

 

[antonz]

The Government needs to be exerting far more pressure than it does. The United States is basically paying increased prices because there are no controls in place so Pharmaceutical companies use the US to make their profits since the rest of the world is Smart enough to not let the Drug Companies run the show. $600 for 2 epipens in the US. $85 for 2 epipens in France.

 

[trembli0s]

Why doesn't she mention the root cause of this, specifically the FDA?

You could pare down the required approval trials/research necessary if the drug is approved in a place like the EU.

Another alternative is to cap the damages possible in a civil suit against drug manufacturers for unforeseen consequences due to a minuscule risk of bad results from the introduction of new drugs that work for 99% of people.

 

[DragonSworne]

I was honestly hoping for more of a step toward single payer. She could have used this issue to push for regulating the price directly instead of doing this competition "encouragement" plan.

 

[shintoki]

Lol at people think she will actually doing anything about it.

At best, they may cut her a favor with the EpiPen issue since it's taking heat, but anything serious is laughable. No chance she is going against her biggest donors.

 

[poppabk]

This will just drive up the prices of new drugs, and result in older drugs being dropped completely.

 

[Riddick]

Nah, that's how it works as far as Republicans are concerned. We're totally cool over here though.

Reminds me of all the complaining liberals did about surveillance, war, lobbyists and the cozy relationship between government and Wall Street during the Bush admin until Obama was elected who continued those grand traditions so suddenly those issues became secondary. "Pfft what can you do, it's how things work in DC" was pretty much the response.

I can barely tolerate people rooting for corrupt corporatist scumbags, imagine how much tolerance I have for them when they're also hypocrites.

 

[AlphaDump]

Jesus Christ.

Fuck it. Yaaaas queen or whatever.

That is about right for you. I was wondering when you were going to crack.

 

[Nafai1123]

Jesus Christ.

Fuck it. Yaaaas queen or whatever.

I'm not sure how you interpreted that from my post, but whatever. You talk of convenience as if doing what she was supposed to do (play house wife like a good little First Lady should and avoid the political game) wouldn't have been the more "convenient" option for her. That was what started the "secrecy" complaints about her to begin with btw, which have continued to this day.

 

[Bruce Springsteen]

It was Clinton's email server that marked Ben Ghazi's medicare application as spam, he never got the life saving medicine he needed

actually laughed at this

 

[Dai101]

The Government needs to be exerting far more pressure than it does. The United States is basically paying increased prices because there are no controls in place so Pharmaceutical companies use the US to make their profits since the rest of the world is Smart enough to not let the Drug Companies run the show. $600 for 2 epipens in the US. $85 for 2 epipens in France.

Or remember that surcharge of $40,000.00 USD for a drug that you can get across the border for less than $100.00 USD??

 

[JustenP88]

I'm not sure how you interpreted that from my post, but whatever. You talk of convenience as if doing what she was supposed to do (play house wife like a good little First Lady should and avoid the political game) wouldn't have been the more "convenient" option for her. That was what started the "secrecy" complaints about her to begin with btw, which have continued to this day.

I don't know that I ever talked of convenience. I commended her for her stance in the op in my first post in this thread. I just take umbrage with how quick everyone is to sprint to her defense when people bring up concerns about money's influence over policy. What she's done with CHIP, etc. has been good work. It's just grating to see people shout down that concern because she's "one of the good ones."

That concern should be voiced whenever that concern is felt, as far as I'm concerned.

 

[Nafai1123]

I don't know that I ever talked of convenience. I commended her for her stance in the op in my first post in this thread. I just take umbrage with how quick everyone is to sprint to her defense when people bring up concerns about money's influence over policy. What she's done with CHIP, etc. has been good work. It's just grating to see people shout down that concern because she's "one of the good ones."

That concern should be voiced whenever that concern is felt, as far as I'm concerned.

I may have misinterpreted your post then, as I took this

I don't like people only caring about this issue as long as it's convenient to them.

as the implication that politicians only do things when they are convenient. Sorry for the confusion I completely agree that money in politics is an issue and should be discussed.

 

[JustenP88]

I may have misinterpreted your post then, as I took this



as the implication that politicians only do things when they are convenient. Sorry for the confusion I completely agree that money in politics is an issue and should be discussed.

Ah, cool. Felt like we might be talking past each other. Sorry for jumping straight to the sarcastic prick thing!