Relevant and even prescient commentary on news, politics and the economy.

How money from sick people works, Part II: The 340B story

by Antonio Ciaccia 46brooklyn Research A January Unlike Any Other In case you didn’t notice from our last report on new year price changes, at the end of December 2023, many insulin vials and pens took significant (i.e., 75%+) list price decreases. Given much of the early 2024 attention on brand drug list price increases, […]

Pharmacogenomics and drug safety

New drugs go through clinical trials before they can be marketed. Phase I trials are for safety. Phase II/III trials are for efficacy. If a drug fails these trials, it can’t be sold. One challenge to drug testing is trial enrollment. Ideally, the subjects should be demographically representative. The problem is that there can be […]

Correcting 11 Washington Post’s Charts That Are Supposed to Tell How the Economy Changed Since Covid

by Dean Baker CEPR Not much of a surprise here the 11 Washington Post’s Charts need some explaining to correct the misinterpretation of them by WaPo. The issue here is the amount of bad or false information floating around in the news media today. People tend to believe what they initially read and go no […]

2025 Medicare Advantage Advance Notice: Small Changes, Missed Opportunities

Pretty much a rewrite to provide simpler reading and a better understanding for readers. My rewrite did not make it much shorter. It is taken from a recent 2025 Health Affairs article. The main thrust of this article being commercial Medicare Advantage insurance companies taking advantage of government payments for healthcare to Medicare patients. The […]

Pig-to-human kidney transplant

There will never be enough human kidneys available to transplant all the patients in renal failure who are on dialysis. While there has been considerable interest in xenotransplantation (sourced, in this case, from pigs), the barriers to sustainable transplant have so far proved insurmountable: these include immune rejection and activation of cryptic viruses. Now, thanks […]

Preventing prevention

Chances are everyone pays for Preventative Care in the overall cost of a policy. There is no obvious cost sharing. This is ridiculous argument on the part of the anti this and that healthcare insurance companies and those who believe the government goes too far in healthcare and then denies the care. Another Bad Moon […]

Flash finding: How drug money from sick people really works

AB: I was searching for a clear, brief, and understandable explanation of how the pharma industry works in delivering pharmaceuticals to patients. This article is one of the better ones out there and has a good and reasonable explanation on how the system works with prices, rebates, etc. A quick email to Antonio and I […]

County shows higher levels of PFAS in blood than the U.S. population

The DHHS report (Michigan) found age, gender and other factors contributed to differing PFAS blood levels Kyle Davidson @ Michigan Advance Angry Bear: Shortly before we left Michigan for other digs. the pollution of water ways due to PFAS was coming more to light where we lived in Livingston County as well as other parts […]