Updating the Indiana Law Blog entry from Wednesday (4/28/04), titled "More on pharmaceutical arbitrage and drug import," is this story from the Business Section of yesterday's NY Times headlined: "Medicare Starts Web Site to Compare Drug Prices." Some quotes:
Medicare plans today to open a Web site designed to help millions of older Americans compare prices of their prescription drugs. The site is the first big-league test for DestinationRx, a little-known company that Medicare hired without competitive bidding to design and run the system.[I tried to check out the drug calculator; I believe this is the direct link. Using it certainly is not effortless as there are several variables involved, including what drug card the user/client/patient has/or will sign up for. As the story notes: "Accurate comparisons are important because the short time frame - 19 months - and because in some cases pays a subscription fee of as much as $30 for a card."]If it works as advertised, Medicare enrollees will be able to visit the site to find prices of their particular medications at nearby stores that will accept Medicare-certified discount cards. They could then use the information to decide which card would help them most when the discount program starts on June 1.
But the program has attracted a number of skeptics. Many industry experts doubt that price transparency can be achieved in a business famous for spreading a fog of consumer confusion. Others wonder if Medicare's Web price-comparison service is even necessary; several free commercial services are already available online. And even among people who think the Medicare comparison site, at www.medicare.gov, is a good idea, some wonder if DestinationRx will prove up to the task. "It is astounding that a tiny firm got that contract on a noncompete basis," said Dr. Arnold Milstein * * *.
The Times story continues:
Companies that already operate drug price-comparison Web sites, including Drugstore.com and PillBot .com, have complained that Medicare administrators did not seek competitive bids before awarding the $3 million, 18-month contract. But executives at DestinationRx, which operates a online discount pharmacy service, insist they qualify because they already have the computer systems that Medicare needs. * * *Medicare Resources Online. Published this week on the excellent LLRX.com is a comprehensive article titled "Medicare Resources Online" that reviews "some of the many online Medicare resources," listing "primarily free resources that emphasize law, policy, and program implementation." Posted by Marcia Oddi at April 30, 2004 08:11 AMDrugstore.com says it will publish its comparisons of the Medicare card prices. It promises to offer some drugs at still lower prices, regardless of whether the buyer has a Medicare-certified discount card. "Our standard discount is 20 to 30 percent off A.W.P.,'' said Greg French, a spokesman for Drugstore.com.
PillBot.com, another online drug information company, also expects to undercut the Medicare card discounts, said Gregg James, a PillBot vice president. The company operates an online pharmacy, RxCorps .com, that offers low-cost generic drugs to Medicare enrollees. "We are going to bring our prices low enough that people will not want to have that drug card,'' he said.