A Quote by Karl Lauterbach
The same drugs are way cheaper in Germany than in America because, obviously, if all sickness funds negotiate with the drug companies for a single price, then the market power of the sickness funds is fully used. So therefore you would expect the prices to be lower for the drugs in Germany, and this is exactly what you see, at least for non-generic drugs.
Related Quotes
I think we have in Germany too many sickness funds. We started with more than 1,000 sickness funds. But the fewer sickness funds there are, the less bureaucracy and the easier the system is to operate. But it is important that the best sickness funds survive.
In Germany there is ranking for contribution rate, so the cheaper sickness funds with good quality can both advertise their better quality plus their lower contribution rates and therefore be gaining members. We had about 240 sickness funds a couple of months ago; we are now down to 213, I think. In two or three years, only 50 or so will survive.
Why are drugs so profitable? Essentially, many argue, it’s because they are illegal. By making drugs a criminal enterprise, it creates an enormous black market economy where drugs fetch far greater prices than they would if legal.
Drug companies spend more on advertising and marketing than on research, more on research on lifestyle drugs than on life saving drugs, and almost nothing on diseases that affect developing countries only. This is not surprising. Poor people cannot afford drugs, and drug companies make investments that yield the highest returns.
Drug prohibition has caused gang warfare and other violent crimes by raising the prices of drugs so much that vicious criminals enter the market to make astronomical profits, and addicts rob and steal to get money to pay the inflated prices for their drugs.
Drug use, some might say, is destroying this country. And we have laws against selling drugs, pushing drugs, using drugs, importing drugs. And the laws are good because we know what happens to people in societies and neighborhoods which become consumed by them. And so if people are violating the law by doing drugs, they ought to be accused and they ought to be
convicted and they ought to be sent up.
The choice is not between drugs and no drugs, but between illegal drugs and legal drugs. Until the 1920s drugs were legal, why not now? Lots of people are on drugs anyway - it is called medication.
They said I ignored the drug problem. Well, I gave speeches on drugs, I wrote books on drugs. I did darn near everything on drugs!
That's what I hate about the war on drugs. All day long we see those commercials: "Here's your brain, here's your brain on drugs", "Just Say No", "Why do you think they call it dope?" … And then the next commercial is [singing] "This Bud's for yooouuuu." C'mon, everybody, let's be hypocritical bastards. It's okay to drink your drug. We meant those other drugs. Those untaxed drugs. Those are the ones that are bad for you.
In some cases it is identical because methamphetamine is one of the F.D.A. drugs allowed for children. The three basic stimulants now are amphetamine, methamphetamine, and then Ritalin, which are all in the same class and Schedule Two drugs along with cocaine, the most addictive drug as recognized by all the world's drug agencies.
One dirty tactic big pharmaceutical companies use is keeping drug prices artificially high through anti-competitive conduct, such as paying competitors millions of dollars to stop them from creating generic drugs.
Most drugs sold in the U.S. are produced outside of the country, and if we can ensure supply-chain safety for these drugs, introducing more of them to the market quicker could mean major differences in the price of drugs, quality of life for patients, and for some Americans the difference between life and death.
Repealing drug laws would remove the risks involved with producing and distributing drugs, bringing 'street prices' crashing down (it's estimated that a 'spoon' of heroin would cost about a quarter in the free market), thereby eradicating any incentive that criminals might have to compete with legitimate businesses, and greatly reducing if not eliminating altogether any economic reason to 'push' drugs on children.
For all of life's discontents, according to the pharmaceutical industry, there is a drug and you should take it. Then for the side effects of that drug, then there's another drug, and so on. So we're all taking more drugs, and more expensive drugs.
When we find unjustified spikes in the prices of long-standing life-saving drugs, we should slap penalties on companies trying to cheat people who need those drugs!
There is one-and only one-way to end the violence in Latin America. There is one-and only one-way to terminate the drug gangs. That way is by legalizing drugs. Legalizing drugs today would put an immediate end to the drug gangs and the drug-war violence.
Related Authors
Albert Einstein Quotes
German
Physicist
Albert Schweitzer Quotes
German
Theologian
Arthur Schopenhauer Quotes
German
Philosopher
Dieter F. Uchtdorf Quotes
German
Businessman
Dietrich Bonhoeffer Quotes
German
Theologian
Eckhart Tolle Quotes
German
Speaker
Franz Kafka Quotes
German
Novelist
Friedrich Nietzsche Quotes
German
Philosopher
Friedrich Schiller Quotes
German
Dramatist
Hermann Hesse Quotes
German
Novelist
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Quotes
German
Novelist
Karl Lagerfeld Quotes
German
Designer
Karl Marx Quotes
German
Philosopher
Martin Luther Quotes
German
Leader
Pope Benedict XVI Quotes
German
Priest
Rainer Maria Rilke Quotes
German
Novelist