Hacker News Reader

Comment by anovikov | Hacker News Reader

Yeah i'm on Wegovy and the price in EU is less than 1/3 the American price. Same company sells it. They just figured that people in the U.S. are used to pay way more. It has nothing to do with insurance inflating price - it's not covered by insurance for almost anyone in either place.

Seriously what's wrong with the U.S. Here in Europe, heating bills can bankrupt people and they have to overpay for rent because gas is so expensive they can't rent further from their jobs - their commute radius is frequently limited with gas costs that are insane - resulting in needlessly dense cities. A separate house is a thing for upper class. All of it sucks, but... no one gets bankrupted by healthcare costs here. This is simply unheard of. And health insurance costs an invisibly small amount. I guess it removes a great deal of worry for health-concerned people.

View on HN

I’m actually exploring legality of shipping meds from EU to us directly to patients.

There is a compounded med that isn’t covered by insurance and I wonder if I could find a pharmacy in my homeland(Poland) to compound and ship it directly to patients. I have found some places that apparently do it but the sites are bad and don’t seem legit.

Why not just fly there and bring in luggage? I fly for my each 3-months pack to Copenhagen, it's also a nice place to hang out.

Because many people in US forums cannot get the medication due to cost. This would benefit everyone.

To save $100 every three months?

Do you still need a prescription to get it in Copenhagen?

Yes, but i live in EU and any prescription issued in EU is valid throughout it, even if the particular drug is not marketed in a country where issued (a doctor always has a right to issue a prescription, because drug approvals are always EU-wide).

This is generally illegal, but my understanding is that it is still done.

I think it's called drug trafficking? I'm no lawyer though.

Read my reply.

It’s illegal, just like the states that first legalized marijuana were. The federal government lays off, seizing a random few shipments. When your drug is on patent, it’s the way to go. Companies like Allergan set up identical process factories in Europe. They purposely don’t fill in the last set of paperwork that would legalize the factory output for export into the U.S. That’s the flimsy mechanism that lets Customs do some window-dressing regulation. Had a problem once, during the Trump Admin. Customs seized a box. I got a nasty, semi-form letter from them. My prescription was replaced at no cost by my mail order provider. They said, “It’s random. Don’t worry about it.” Cost of doing business.

Been doing it for a decade. It’s a huge business. Had one shipment seized by Customs. It was promptly replaced, at no cost to me, by the UK source.

> their commute radius is frequently limited with gas costs that are insane

where in the eu are you talking about? every time i visit/talk to friends there it seems to be the opposite because public transit is ubiquitous and you can get a train out to all sorts of small towns and villages.

Where in Europe are you? Even with our screwy property market, in the UK detached houses are hardly for the upper class only. Maybe in London, or somewhere like Cambridge.

>Europe

>needlessly dense cities

Guess you've never been in Asia? European cities are far from too dense.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com