| > Not to mention it is slightly unethical in the US due to drug rebates incentivizing branded drug use. This is an area I'm only perephrially aware of, but the way I understand it is: * Manufacturer sells very expensive injectible eye drug, in the range of $2k/injection. * It's typically covered by insurance, but patients (in this demogrpahic who are often on medicare) can still have high deductibles and copayments/coinsurance costs. * To get around this, the manufacturer funds a nonprofit organization that patients can apply to for financial help paying for their deductibles. * The manufacturer gets a write-off for donating to a nonprofit, and while they might cover, say, $2k or $5k of a patient's deductible over the course of a year, they still get $22k in revenue covered by Medicare for a year's worth of injections for that patient. * There was some issue recently where maybe someone realized that "a charity funded by a drug manufacturer exclusively for the purpose of reimbursing purchases of that manufacturer's drugs" might not be a wholly above board charity, but I'm not sure if that was resolved. All this is hearsay from my perspective, but am I in the ballpark of what you were talking about? |