[JamesBarney]

Healthcare and pharmaceuticals are not even in the ball park of a normal free market.

1. Monopolies - We give monopolies to pharmaceutical companies to incentivize R&D.

2. Principal-Agent problem - Doctors guide, and make decisions about care for consumers. But However consumers of health care have different incentives than doctors.

3. Insurance - Most individuals are relatively shielded from the costs of their healthcare.

4. Public Good - Many people want to live in a society where people do not die from easily treatable conditions.

So yes a free markets is always the optimal solution given a certain set of assumptions. Unfortunately very few of these assumptions are true in healthcare.