“Find the world’s lowest prices on prescription drugs.” That is the promise of TrumpRx, the new website unveiled on Friday, February 6, by the White House to provide American patients with a selection of discounted treatments, displayed in bold letters on the platform’s homepage. Announced in September, the initiative aims to symbolize the administration’s yearlong efforts to lower healthcare costs in the United States.
The launch of the website, which features discounts ranging from 33% to 93%, followed a series of confidential agreements reached in recent months between Washington and 17 major pharmaceutical companies worldwide. The pharmaceutical groups committed, among other things, to selling some of their products directly at prices significantly below the standard rates for patients paying out of pocket, that is, without any reimbursement from their health insurance. Serving as a platform connecting patients and pharmaceutical companies, TrumpRx is ultimately expected to consolidate all the offers made available by each drug manufacturer.
Donald Trump has made the development of direct-to-consumer sales one of the pillars of his strategy to lower drug prices. The US president sees expanding this sales channel as a way for pharmaceutical companies to reduce their prices by bypassing pharmacy benefit managers, whom he accused of driving up costs.
However, there are doubts in the US about the success of the initiative. Despite the steep discounts, the platform’s appeal could be limited for most Americans, who already have health insurance that helps minimize out-of-pocket expenses. “If you have insurance, check your copay first – it could be even lower,” TrumpRx warns on its website.
Sadistic sociopath who abhors poor people offers medicine for only poor people. What could possibly go wrong?
Sure it’s just chalk pressed into the shape of a pill, but it was cheap.
My bet is some sort of industrial waste.
Yeah I mean, chalk, rat poison, industrial waste. Whatever’s cheapest that day.