US Drugmaker Raises Price of Vitamins By More Than 800% (ft.com)

David Crow, reporting for the Financial Times: A US drugmaker is charging almost $300 for a bottle of prescription vitamins that can be bought online for less than $5, in the latest attempt at price gouging in the world's largest healthcare market. Avondale Pharmaceuticals raised the price of Niacor, a prescription-only version of niacin, by 809 per cent last month, taking a bottle of 100 tablets from $32.46 to $295 (Editor's note: the link may be paywalled; alternative source), according to figures seen by the Financial Times. Although niacin, a type of vitamin B3, is available in over-the-counter forms for less than $5 per 100 tablets, some doctors still prefer to use the version approved by the US Food and Drug Administration to treat high cholesterol. Avondale, a secretive Alabama-based company, put the price of Niacor up shortly after acquiring the rights to the medicine in a so-called "buy-and-raise" deal -- a strategy made famous by Martin Shkreli, the disgraced biotech entrepreneur.

Comments

MD here

[Anonymous Coward]

"some doctors still prefer to use"

If your doctor does this, just find a new doctor. There is no good reason to put up with this.

Re:Socialism is an easy fix for cases like this.

[Anonymous Coward]

Congratulations. In just a few words, you managed to betray a staggering amount of ignorance with regards to;

1. vitamins or their "development"
2. socialism
3. life expectancy in "socialist" countries (hint: it's higher and increasing) such as Canada, the United Kingdom and Australia, compared to USA (hint: it's lower and decreasing).
4. health care costs in "socialist" countries such as Canada, the United Kingdom and Australia, compared to USA.

I suppose we can only blame the - equally - sorry state of education in the USA.