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AARP: Over-50 Crowd Struggling With Prescription Costs
Illinois' over-50 population is struggling with prescription drug prices, according to a survey conducted by AARP Illinois.

Results of the survey of membership, age 50 and over:

* 20 percent of respondents are cutting back on other necessities to pay for drugs

* 21 percent didn't fill or delayed filling a prescription due to cost

* 18 percent took less than the prescribed amount to make what they have last longer

* 63 percent are worried about their ability to afford prescription drugs in the future.

David Irwin of the AARP says there are three problems:

* Medicare drug coverage, known as Part D, leaves a so-called "doughnut hole" between roughly $2,700 and $6,100 in annual drug costs, within which beneficiaries must pay 100 percent of the cost of their medication.

* The price of name-brand drugs rose 8.7 percent last year, the biggest increase in six years.

* While most name-brand drugs go out-of-patent in five years, enabling off-brand manufacturers to sell the same product at a much cheaper price, under current law, the patents on so-called biologics will never expire. Legislation is pending to impose a 12-year limit on these patents.

Irwin says when members of the Illinois congressional delegation are home for the August recess, residents should tell them to close the Medicare Part D doughnut hole, and to impose shorter patents on name-brand drugs.

(Illinois Radio Network)
07 19 09 by Newsroom
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