Friday, May 23, 2008

Speaking of Prescriptions...

I've occasionally complained here about the rising cost of health care in this country. It's a topic I've read a lot about, and I've come to the conclusion that the dire tales are not exaggerated; that there really are families in this country — and not a small number of them — who have their lives financially destroyed when someone in the family gets ill. This includes a staggering number who have health insurance and think it will cover every contingency. There are also those who die because they can't afford good treatment.

For many, the daunting cost is prescriptions. Some medications are prohibitively expensive. In the last year, I've had five separate friends in the position of not being able to afford the pills that their doctors believe they need. Human beings should not be in that situation.

Here's something that may help someone. I don't think it's been publicized much but some big chain stores have inaugurated generic prescription deals. The Ralphs Market chain, for example, has a long list of medications you can get at their stores at the lovely price of four bucks for a 30 day supply. One of these is a medication that I used to take. It's the one I wrote about in this item that cost me $10 for a 60 day supply because of my insurance but which ran $91.88 if you didn't have insurance. That's quite a savings. Here's a page that tells all about the program.

The Walmart chain has a similar program and so do the Target stores. There may be others.

Some of you probably knew all about these offers but none of my friends who couldn't afford their pills knew about 'em. They just thought a prescription was something you took to your Friendly Neighborhood Pharmacy and the price there was the price. In case there's anyone reading this site who thinks that way, I wanted to mention these new generic programs.

• Posted at 11:37 PM · LINK

Super Prescription!

Bill Neville just sent me this. John McCain's medical records were opened briefly for press inspection this morning and CNN has an article up that lists the medications that he's taking. Here's the list and this is the exact same order they're given on the CNN website...

• Simvastatin, a cholesterol-lowering medicine
• Hydrochlorothiazide, for kidney stone prevention
• Amiloride, which preserves potassium in the bloodstream
• Aspirin, for blood clot prevention
• Zyrtec, an antihistamine, which he uses as necessary for nasal allergies
• Ambien CR, used as necessary to help him sleep when traveling
• A Multi-vitamin tablet

You will notice I've boldfaced the first letter of each item. This is not exactly how it's traditionally spelled — Captain Marvel didn't have the double "a" — but if you take those letters in the order CNN listed the medications, they spell out...

• Posted at 1:02 PM · LINK

me on the radio

I'm still turning up on radio and radio-like talk shows to discuss Jack Kirby and that there book I done writ about him. Tomorrow (Saturday), I'll be doing it on Pop Culture America, which is heard on Blogtalk radio. The show starts at 3 PM Eastern time, Noon out in my neck of the woods, and I should be on around a half-hour into the proceedings and talking for maybe 15-30 minutes. This link will take you to a page that will probably get you there and have reruns after the fact.

• Posted at 12:17 PM · LINK

Today's Video Link

In 2000, Conan O'Brien gave a commencement speech to the graduating class at his alma mater, Harvard. Way back in this post, we linked you to a transcript of what he said. Now, we link you to video of the speech. It runs about twenty minutes.

• Posted at 12:33 AM · LINK