Medications can begin to become a significant expense in a person's life. Take the example of a person who has never taken regular medications, and does not have to budget their drug purchases. Then they begin to develop a sleeping problem. First, they try some of the natural methods, keeping their room cool and perhaps purchasing a white noise machine. Then they try some of the over-the-counter drugs to help sleep.
If none of these works, then they consult with their doctor to try various sleeping medications. Sometimes, the sleep disorder is so serious, that the only drug that works is a recently developed sleeping pill. As a recently developed medication, it will probably not have a generic version. Recent versions of a popular sleeping pill were running hundreds of dollars for a monthly supply. Trying to get your insurance to pay for this drug can be problematic if not impossible. Now this person is faced with a conundrum: they must somehow budget hundreds of dollars or learn to do without a good night's sleep.
Many people wonder why drugs are so expensive in the first place. The problem is that medications are one of the most expensive things to develop in the world. The pill that eventually becomes the leading sleeping medicine starts as an idea with a pharmaceutical research scientist. He is employed by a large company with lots of resources. This is the only type of company that can afford to develop a drug. The initial drug design may come as a variation of an existing sleeping medication, or it may come from a drug with an entirely different use. Many medications have come from drugs where the final use was only originally a side effect of the original target use.
Following the inception of an idea, the drug goes through extensive test on lab animals. This process will take many years. Even if the medical industry were to find a miracle cure for cancer, one that would save many existing patients, they would not be allowed to bypass these tests. Doing so could mean prison. The Food & Drug Administration (FDA) that monitors the development process wants to make sure that all risks have been minimized as much as possible before human trials.
Then begin the trials with volunteers, often gathered from the prison population. This process will also take years. Even at this late stage, promising drugs will fail and the entire expensive process lost. One famous example is the illegal hallucinogen LSD, which actually began as a promising headache remedy, but ended up causing "bad trips" in human trials.
It may be an entire decade before a drug reaches the market. At that time, the development company is heavily invested. Patents protect the company from generics and other competitors and allow them to recoup their costs and make a profit.
This shows why some important drugs must be expensive, and why having a medication discount card is
so important.
