Big Bad Wolf
Big Pharma - along with armaments, oil and illegal drugs, one of the biggest businesses in the world - has much to answer for.
Not the last of which is running its affairs often by bribe and collusion.
In pharmacies across Canada, the giant pharmaceuticals compete by paying pharmacies large rebates to stock their products. As a result, the biggest cost to manufacturers isn't manufacturing – it's paying those rebates, the cost of which is passed along to the consumer and pushes up the price of prescriptions.
Generics, while cheaper, are often harder to come by precisely because of the legal and not so legal tactics of the big name-brand manufacturers.
In short, our high and higher and higher cost of health care in this country is powerfully affected - some would say controlled - by private, corpoarte special interests.
The Ontario Premier, Dalton McGuinty is setting out to fight these good folk.
We wish him well and ask when the other leaders across the country will step into the fray and show some real commitment to holding the line on costs.
Cutting seniors' care and MRI availabilities is not the way to go.
