prescription drugs isn't saying for most people i've not ever heard anybody say i love buying my drugs it doesn't cost me anything you know i have no problem most people complain and they say that america has the highest prescription drug cost in the world yeah i mean is that it's terrible we're going to try to talk about that now a little bit trump on his campaign trail president trump talked about how he thought it was just awful and pharmacy companies pharmaceutical companies are getting away with murder and you know he he wanted to put a stop to the price gouging so far nothing has changed and people are saying is it really something that the government can control is is it a just a bad product of the environment of the way everything runs the insurance companies control what they will and won't pay the pharmaceutical companies charge what drugs you can take take which ones are accessible which ones aren't and sometimes they just make drugs that people really need insulin yeah cancer drugs yeah the epi pen exact raese crazy prices  people can afford it and they can make all the money ok so why do why are the way a drug pricing like how does it all work there's nothing stopping them other countries drive a harder bargain with drug companies in the us allows drug companies to pretty much set their own prices as you'll know when demand for a product is high companies often raise the prices that's exactly what they do for prescription drugs so they know we want them and need them here and make us pay for them for example millions of people have things like high cholesterol high blood pressure and diabetes which can be treated successfully with prescription medications and more recently the drug makers have developed game changing therapies to host for hoose of serious illnesses such as m s hepatitis c and several cancers so people are living longer and then the supply of a newer medicine is controlled entirely by the drug manufacturer that holds the patent rights so that there's a manufacturer monopoly on the drug for the twenty year wife of the pat during that five time it's free to raise the price as frequently as and as much as the market will bear it's terrible it's they know we need them yeah exactly they know where the big demand is and that's where they raise prices but it's not some big company who's paying for it and the insurance companies don't pay practically anything for them they know it's coming out of the pocket of that sick yeah patient need yeah that's disgusting were it's like the ever get your say like i have when i get my medicine my my prescription says i paid twenty dollars for the prescription but it will say i'd insurance save me two hundred twelve dollars my never says i'm sure it saved me that much oh my insurance i don't have a prescription plan through our insurance really so very often it's it doesn't lower the price a lot at all and it's terrible yeah and a lot of insurance plans don't come with the prescription part so it's terrible and you don't save ton of money right now they say it's it's a contorted marketplace like if you needed a new t v you do research and shop around you pick the best model right and then this way you can say ok well i saw that this place had it for this price this place had it for this price and you have like negotiation room you can decide where you buy it and how much you want to pay for it right but when it comes to drugs we don't have much of a choice exactly because if you go pretty much to any pharmacy what your insurance company is going to pay is what they're going to pay and what you're going to start paying is what you get some pain right and you have no options so what do you do because you're you're in need of the medication you can't not take it and if you really don't have the money people are borrowing and begging and putting in a credit card and going into the air over trying to buy medicine exactly yeah it's a say occur because you need you know they figure you need this to be to stay alive or they just don't take it they can write down the amounts or doses or don't buy the whole thing because and then that's not helping their condition and it could put them in harm's way in a very crazy medical state  pharmaceutical companies have been coming up with strategies to try to you know keep on top of it you know they just they negotiate different things with the insurance companies as to kind of the contracts of what they will pay generic versus brand name and how much for each one and we don't get to take part in any of that you know we get whatever insurance were assigned either through work or however and they negotiate what they will and won't pay for what they can take and then were subject to just having to follow it so here's an interesting fact in two hundred two thousand and fifteen americans spent four hundred fifty seven billion dollars on prescription drugs which is up by about the percent over two thousand and fourteen and two thousand and fifteen trying to guess how much the median salary of a pharmaceutical c e o with is two thousand and fifteen fourteen point five million dollars wow i got to get my resume out there that's make your fourteen point five million dollars three houses exactly and your own helicopter and things like that terrible so when we look at research and development drug companies spend over ten years and up to two point six billion dollars all the tests and the research and studies that they claim to do is what drives up the price as well and you don't give you all the information they don't tell you about all the adverse effects and all of the problems that they really had they hide that just so they  done it's crazy and they say too that you know you lose the power because a lot of times your insurance company negotiates with a middleman with the drug manufacturer and all of these people have to hand in how much your co pay is going to be right or whether or not you're allowed to take a generic where you can only take a generic and they dictate these non medical people most of them don't have much medical training their pharmaceutical reps benefit managers and insurance people yeah they decide what medicine you know group a of this insurance company should get how is that fair kind of thing where you know what the people's needs are exactly it should be based on need  diabetes so it's not the case my brother has it he's on insulin he pays a fortune for his insulin and he was with one company and left got a different job any chance companies changed and he i mean he was already paying close to two hundred dollars a month for isn't solenn and that it went up to something like four hundred something dollars wow why why they said the same but we don't know well what do i do i can't afford that we don't know that's how much it  so i mean you know what do do you so he's working out with a new doctor who's trying to try some of the new pills that are out right because they're a little bit longer lasting and in some cases more effective than the insulin injections  cheaper yeah so if she can wean him off that and get him on this whole saving a ton of money and having to stay on medicine last but most doctors want to do that they don't sit there and try to help you figure out what can i give you instead to make it easier for you and cheaper for you and that's what some of our message is today is you should ask you can ask your doctor at any time and say look i just went to the pharmacy and they told me my prescription is four hundred something dollars i don't have the money what can you give me instead and they will sometimes try to figure it out yeah because i forget the one medication i saw as a commercial on t v they said if you can afford it to contact the manufacturer and they can help you with the cost of it quite often many of the drug manufacturers have special grant sections where they'll give so many people a year free of a drug or continue it on for a long period time so it doesn't hurt to ask and they also have different states like even new jersey we have a discount pharmacy program that all you have to do is say to your pharmacist i would like to play for the new jersey discount pharmacy card and they have all the information at the pharmacy every pharmacy and it's two seconds that your name your birthdate your social security number or something and they plug it in and then they can tell you whether you usually get additional discount it doesn't matter if you have insurance even if you have insurance you can still ask for that and they'll say well your insurance will give you this medication for twenty dollars but the new jersey one discounted it down to ten well that was my question i was going to ask you if you know something if you already have used to do and i did i didn't believe some doctor told me about well some pharmacist actually told me about it we tried it and that gave me a better price than my insurance so that time we used new jersey discount and the next time i went in it was different my insurance was giving me a better price so we just went back and forth and they get the money from the state so it's worth asking you can keep them both on your account in the pharmacy you go to and they'll check the next time you go ask for the new jersey discount pharmacy card and they'll tell you all about it and see if they can help you out and if you have no insurance at all it's definitely a bonus because at least it's something exactly now do you get mail order prescriptions or do you know i don't like doing that because i don't know would use drugs are coming from the way to be made by a great you know because my husband's  surance plan sent everyone every couple months they'll send us a letter that says do i want to join up there are a mail order me order they can open it to me too and i'm like that and i first thing i do is i put it in this shredder because i figure i don't know where these meds are are being mean or where they're coming from yeah and i know places have some medications that they've had problems of i'm being counterfeit and you have to consider it's going through the mail our mail system now is money you know they've closed a bunch of post offices they bleed off a lot of workers yeah so i'm sure you've noticed you get your mail later it's takes the people longer here is your medication which is heat sensitive yeah light sensitive yeah where it's controlled in a hot post office yeah in a postal truck in a you know still bag it was one hundred ten here the other day yeah if they're old and onto your medication don't you think it's gotten expose have gotten the wrong prescription they go to refill it through the mail and then they wait for it they're almost out and then they get it and it's a different manufacturer a different you know you know and they call and say this is wrong i can't have it  to wait till i mail you something else and if you're out of your medication you either have to take the wrong one or run to a local pharmacy to get them to give you a few in the meantime it's a pain yeah i wouldn't do it when i first got home from my stroke the insurance person came over and they were going over like my medications and they said they have this service basically which would take my my prescriptions and would put them all in like those packs so that today i would have a stream of blister pack medicine this is a cure in a clocks it is this is your twelve noons we you know you  i went to my doctor about it because he might my primary and explain to him what they wanted to do he wasn't thrilled he said they keep calling him in one of the fax over the the prescriptions again and again and he  new for the week yeah i mean if you're able to do it you have the time to do it you're able to do it why would you trust someone else to do it yeah pay someone else to do it because i have because it was going to come in the mail i had some questions about the integrity of the medication and stuff they couldn't answer them oh well they can't answer questions yeah you know right there it's problems and this poor guy kept hounding me like a dog you know coming over you know kind of some will sell me the candy you know and it was like an act you know you know what i do i go to the pharmacist because if i have a question about a side effect or something he's right there i can ask them say you know some people are all about making it easy they don't care they're just like oh if somebody is going to do something to me give it to me all done they're not going to think gee i wonder where it's coming from or if they have a steak or if it's even my medicine i mean yeah exactly but here i am getting this packet with like these five pills in it and i'm just going to pop on you know i'm going to take it at eight o'clock because that's what this said and who knows you who on earth put it in a little package yeah yeah  don't think that's a safe way to go yeah so i'm glad you didn't do that either i know i was like you know run away run away it's terrible how much they try to control over what you do  and how you do it but but but i think it's sounds like a good concept where it's all you know it's all done for you oh you have to just pull out today's list you know stream of pills and it's  the idea unless i know more about you know if it's done by like a pharmacy and pharmacy techs and yeah you know i mean we trust them now to count how many pills and put them in our bottle and over that yeah i would go for that but if it's done like in a factory warehouse kind of thing  those who now i know i don't think we're there yet now because i asked what happens if the doctor changes your dose and you've got this whole this real of medications now i don't need to take one of these pills were they going to do return everything we're going to have to do it again you know through the whole month again i think yeah but what they say they had no answer oh my god tony was this have or you would just have to do is have your doctor fax over the new prescription yeah i know that but what i do with all these old ones i don't need that i paid for whatever you want yeah you can contact them easily you can go there you can talk to them in person they can look over the things that you're taking you know when you do it by mail order yeah you're talking to who knows who on the phone right usually not a pharmacist now just somebody who's paid to answer the phones and they have a script of what your answers are and if you don't know what was great was when i was in bridgewater we had this little pharmacists it was a small independent guy what was great about him was he knew everybody he knew everything your history he would tell you about any interaction or side effect to look for and he and he would go oh he was very thorough and then we moved then he ended up selling his pharmacy retired there's still a  few like mom and pop kind of more you see there around but not a lot that all been put out of business by me as guys that's it's sad because they knew exactly who you were going on and you like that relationship and it's different now but but the thing is is that we definitely as far as you know what do i do with prescription drugs or too much you just you really have to not be afraid to speak up you have to talk to your doctor you have to call the manufacturer and say yeah you have this drug and i needed and i can't afford it what are my options and a lot of times people don't realize that but they do have programs and plans for their evil give it to you at a discounted rate so give it to you for free they have special grants as they call them and they're able to give you so many your supplies if you fill out and fit the criteria yeah but you have to ask it's not like they advertise it they don't run around right i call us call us we're going to give out free medicine it's but you should try exactly and you know your doctors will do what they can that they don't know they give you a prescription and you leave the office and you go to the pharmacy right and they don't see it so the next time you come they had no idea that you got to the pharmacy and they said your medicine was two hundred fifty dollars because your insurance doesn't cover it right unless you call and say hello i need help i need an alternative i need this i need that and then they'll usually work with you to have to have that relationship with your doctor and that goes back to again if you don't have a good relationship with your doctor for the day you're at the you're at the mercy you've got to find a new one yeah yeah i mean you know you don't deal with doctors who aren't on the up that out right about exactly you're out that say the next one how long do you think it takes to bring a prescription drug to market well they make you sound sometimes like it's yours is it yours it takes about ten years ten years and first would takes about thirty one months scientists study the disease to find how they're going to to go about attacking the medic the illness chemically so once they get that they have to do trials so the first trial takes about twenty months  the second trial is in phase two is thirty months so roughly sixty percent of phase one trials proceed to phase two which you see involves one hundred to three hundred people with the disease so they do that they tested on these with you know people trying trials and they have to test the drug at different dosages then the third trial is thirty one months so with that they look at you know they they tested on on people and they look to see at the the side effects and stuff like that and then if everything goes ok then it goes further yeah if it doesn't then it stops because i've read that people things at different trials yeah so yeah where does it go to after get past that trial they haven't you know the government has since two months to the they try to approve it for the food and drug administration ok so the f d a puts their seal of approval on it yeah and then once that happens then they say here they launch it for the first three years is the big marketing campaign ok so that would be all t so sometimes when it first comes on the market it may be the most affordable at that point right so do stock up on it yeah well i mean you don't want to either because it just came off a trial you don't even know if it has terrible side effects because half the time they don't do long term studies so you don't know a lot so you're almost like a guinea pig and yes because if you look at it if you're look at side effects noise you're vomiting diarrhea is like this about every medication right and then they go on it  of the side effects could be please tell your doctor if your ears fall off if your fingers follow up like really kidney failure yeah sometimes it's like when you hear the side effects you think is it really worth getting rid of my migraines so that  u get all of these problems exactly sometimes i guess you got to do the risk versus the benefit exactly definitely what else you have something there with a stick around is that something important that we should mention how to pay less for drugs oh yeah how do we do that use a preferred pharmacy ok go generic yeah if you can whenever you can go generic you know your best bet and if you know what your insurance covers yes definitely no if you go if you don't know pick up the phone call because everything is the er tear level drugs this is a first here this is a second here this is a third tier right and so you want to find out where you got prescribe to what here it's in yeah and if you can say coming in a different here because yeah because that's going to affect your prices oh look at number three your favorite order by mail they now see let me on that topic i can do better before yeah they say you can save money yeah so i was against it it want to do it but they keep sending me this letter you know mail order mail you save money you save money so i went online because they have a graph right and you can put it in what you take and they'll show you where c b s s price walgreens price cost goes price and if you order us by mail there is like a two dollar difference right i said two dollars for what i know is exactly i'm not going to go through that so what are some of the other ones before we want to show here one of the thing they said is split pills when safe that said i don't do that i do that to your doctor yeah actor says it's ok to start cutting your dose in half other what is useful that can afford their medication that's what they do yeah and some pills aren't meant to be cut in half right exact only messes with the integrity in the way it metabolizes in your body you know you don't ever do that you know much you talk to your doctor yeah but there are ways is the kind of end of the story you're going to think you just you have to ask you have to be proactive you have to research call the manufacturers talk to your pharmacist pharmacists or some of the best sources they are formation they are because this is all they do all day long is deal with drugs and so you know some of the ins and outs and yeah somebody who came in earlier that day they may have found a way to get them a deal and they can share it with you yeah so be smart do what you can they cut your cost of prescription drugs you know always remember get educated