Editorial: Prescription drug costs out of control

Friday, Nov. 5, 1999 | 9:08 a.m.

Seniors certainly weren't surprised this week by a report -- funded by a group advocating that prescription drug benefits be added to Medicare -- that found the prices of drugs they take have been climbing fast. The study by University of Minnesota researches, paid for by Families USA, discovered that in 1998 the wholesale prescription prices for drugs typically used by the elderly had shot up 6.6 percent at a time when the overall inflation rate was steady at 1.6 percent.

Nearly two-thirds of the 39 million Americans on Medicare receive some sort of prescription benefit, but health insurers increasingly are either reducing the amount of coverage or abandoning it altogether. President Clinton, worried about this trend, is seeking to pass legislation that would add drug benefits as part of Medicare coverage. But pharmaceutical companies' opposition is causing the plan to stall in the Republican-controlled Congress. It is time for this Congress to awaken from its slumber and realize that action is needed soon. Otherwise there is the very real prospect that some seniors may forgo their medications if they can't find an affordable way to pay for them.