During July, we celebrate Independence Day, and there is a lot to be grateful for this year. Thanks to new leadership in Congress, a new vaccine against COVID-19 and front-line American workers, the pandemic death toll is finally shrinking and life is returning to normal for millions.
American veterans like me understand what it is like to fight for the basics. Millions of veterans have sacrificed and contributed in countless ways to protect freedoms, ensure our security and save lives through the years.
But, as we all learned during the pandemic, sometimes simply protecting the status quo does more harm than good.
Prescription drug prices are a great example. The ridiculously high price of prescriptions in the United States presents a clear and present danger to millions of Americans who need medicines but cannot afford them, because drug corporations have been allowed to hike prices at will.
Whether it is new drugs such as the Alzheimer’s treatment that just launched at $56,000 per year or insulin, which has been around for 100 years, drug corporations’ monopoly power to set and raise prices leaves Americans with no choice but to pay two to four times more for medicines in the United States than people in other countries.
Skipping doses, getting into debt or forgoing treatment altogether because Congress won’t take action to make medicines affordable is not my idea of liberty.
As long as Congress does nothing to stop the drug corporations from raising their prices much faster than the rate of inflation, a practice that has made drug corporations the most profitable industry, lawmakers are choosing to be complicit in keeping patients captive to Big Pharma profits.
As President Biden pointed out, we know how to address the problem: require price negotiations in Medicare. He was not the first to urge negotiations: President Trump promised to make drug corporations “negotiate like crazy,” in his 2016 campaign before ditching that promise in 2019.
We have a great existing model in the Department of Veterans Affairs that demonstrates how policies such as negotiating drug prices can make medicines much more affordable for the nation and for patients.
The federal government’s own research shows that when negotiation is used in the Veterans Health Administration, the Department of Defense and Medicaid, prices are half of what drugs cost in Medicare, where negotiations are prohibited, according to the U.S. Government Accountability Office.
Personally, I save between $150 and $200 per month by purchasing my prescription medications through the Veterans Health Administration instead of Medicare.
I know the danger of going without medicines. When I waited to qualify for Medicare after becoming disabled, I was unable to afford the prescription meds to treat my diabetes. As a result, I was left with neuropathy that remains a danger to me today.
Veterans experience mental illness, post-traumatic stress and traumatic brain injury at higher rates than the rest of the population. High suicide rates among post-9/11 veterans testify to increased need for treatment of PTSD, depression and other disorders that are more and more common among young veterans.
And while 9 million or so veterans get services through the VHA, many more have private insurance, enroll in Medicare as they age or depend on Medicaid. Around 6% of veterans have no coverage, including an estimated 46,348 in Pennsylvania.
Drug price reforms that would enable Medicare to negotiate lower prices and then extend those prices to everyone, such as the Lower Drug Costs Now Act in the House, are commonsense measures that would benefit everyone — including veterans. The bill also has provisions that would hold drug corporations accountable for jacking up prices higher than the rate of inflation and put caps on out-of-pocket costs.
That is important for many veterans coming home — a third of whom struggle to pay bills and access health care because of affordability, according to the Pew Research Center. Neither Democrats nor Republicans have an excuse for inaction given that a majority of voters in both parties supports negotiations.
Veterans have fought for and preserved American independence for generations. Now we are counting on Congress to protect our health by freeing us from pharmaceutical price gouging that puts our lives at risk.
It is time for lawmakers to lower drug prices now.
Tim Talley is a Navy veteran who lives in Allentown.
