HARRISBURG, Pa. — As Pennsylvania state lawmakers weigh key measures to protect residents from Big Pharma’s skyrocketing drug prices, patients are calling for reform. One bill would require more transparency from drug manufacturers, triggered by price increases that hit certain thresholds. A second measure would establish a Prescription Drug Pricing Task Force to study the issue of rising drug prices and recommend legislative solutions.
HB 568 would:
HB 1042 would:
“Pennsylvanians are desperate for relief from crushing drug prices,” said David Mitchell, a cancer patient and the founder of Patients For Affordable Drugs Now. “While there is still work to be done to lower the list prices of drugs, these important bills could give state residents more information about rising costs and reasonable solutions to assuage unrelenting price increases.”
Today, Patients For Affordable Drugs Now published a series of patient stories on its website to underscore the urgency of the drug pricing crisis in Pennsylvania.
Melissa Evans, Wilkes-Barre, PA: “Affording all of the medications I need to survive has become such a burden. I have to make many difficult decisions to make sure my needs are met. Half of the time I don’t even take my prescriptions because the co-pays are just far too high. I don’t fill it if I can’t afford it –– it’s as simple as that.”
Michelle Rzeplinski, McAdoo, PA: “These drug prices are killing me, both in the physical and the financial sense. If my drugs were more affordable, my health would greatly improve. Lower prices would mean better access to the medications that are prescribed to me.”
Lynn Seabrook, Wilkes-Barre, PA: “It is sad to say, but I sometimes feel like I would be better off dead –– especially at the end of the month, after prescriptions have been purchased and we are completely broke. My husband has not had a new pair of shoes in years, and I worry about the burden my drug costs places on my family.”
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