While drugs produced in America are rated as of the best quality in the world, many Americans refuse to buy medicines made by their home country but travel to other countries to buy drugs or order online.
Why is there such a paradox? While the Vietnamese races to order American drugs, Americans prefer to buy medicines abroad.
According to the International Federation of Health Plans, Americans pay for drugs two to six times more expensive than all other countries, including neighboring countries like Canada and Mexico. Cancer treatment drugs or special drugs are very expensive while common drugs are relatively expensive. For example, a patient treated with Gleevec (a remarkable cancer treatment) in the US must spend $6,214 per month, while the patient pays $46USD in the UK for this medicine and $52USD in Holland. Humira, an arthritis drug prices $2,246 in the US compared to $881 in Switzerland.
That is why Americans buy foreign drugs, especially in two border regions of Canada and Mexico. William Brooks is one of thousands of Americans who cross the border to Canada or Mexico to buy drugs. He is a US citizen, has employment and is entitled to health insurance at work. He suffered from skin disease and has to use cream for redness on his face.
Under the terms of insurance, he only paid $14 for medicines he needed. However, he still does not buy medicines in the United States and accepts no insurance card and goes to the other side of the border, Los Algodones, Mexico to buy this prescription with only $6. Mr. William Brooks is a sample about buying drug abroad although he has insurance. Those who are unemployed without health insurance or the elderly dependent on social welfare, the medical expense is really a burden to them.
Most Americans feel that pharmaceutical companies are targeting profit before the task of producing medicines. A survey conducted by the Kaiser Family Foundation found reported that 72% of Americans believed that the price of medicines in the US was unreasonable and expect the pharmaceutical companies to be transparent about pharmaceutical prices.
Professor Alan Sager, a lecturer at the Academy of Public Health said that a purchase of foreign drugs is a safe solution for Americans.
Although it is illegal to buy drugs overseas and transport across the US border, customs officials often do not confiscate individual passenger’s medicines through the border because they do not want to take medications from patients.