Little Good About America Spending Twice as Much on Diabetes Drugs

A few months back, I wrote a bit mockingly about the power that 24 million diabetics and 57 million Americans with prediabetes might wield if they united under a common banner.

What I didn’t say was what those numbers could mean for our health-care system if everyone in the prediabetes group eventually developed diabetes. Can you imagine the medical resources 71 million diabetics could consume in a country of 300 million? Good luck getting a parking space at your local hospital!

We’re all paying for it
Last week a study on diabetes drug expenses perfectly illustrated the impact this blood-glucose-intolerant epidemic could have on health-care costs: Spending on diabetes drugs doubled in the last seven years. The study blamed the high cost of newer diabetes drugs like sitagliptin (Januvia) and exenatide (Byetta).

If you have health insurance or pay taxes, chances are you’re paying part of this tab. When I get my Byetta prescription filled, for example, I pay $50 for a 30-day supply. But the actual cost is more than $200. If you’re in my group, you’re helping me pay this cost, along with my employer.

Play this out across federal entitlements like Medicaid and Medicare, which partially pay for both medications and treatment for many diabetics, and you realize we all pay for the surge in diabetes in the form of state and federal taxes.

News that diabetes drug costs have doubled, then, should concern everyone. Newer, more expensive drugs are the main factor, according to the study, but not the only reason drug costs have increased overall. There are also more diabetics taking more drugs; I, for one, have taken up to four medications at one time just to treat my condition.

The (maybe) good news
The increased use of drugs is part of newer, more aggressive therapies designed to help diabetics better manage their blood sugar and stave off complications like blindness, neuropathy, and kidney failure.

And that’s the only part of this study that could be interpreted as good news. If these therapies and new drugs actually work (so far, they haven’t proven any more effective than older, cheaper alternatives), then we could end up saving money in the long run. A new kidney, for example, costs the people who pay for health care—all of us—substantially more than daily doses of diabetes drugs.

If all this extra spending prevented those complications, you’d probably find parking at the hospital. Just don’t count on a good space at the drugstore.