Letter: What justifies the cost of insulin?
(Francisco Kjolseth | Tribune file photo) Packages of insulin unpacked by Mindie Hooley and her family before an Oct. 23, 2019, meeting of a local chapter of the support group T1 International in Salt Lake City.
Thank you, Rep. Norm Thurston, for sponsoring H.B. 207 to reduce the price of insulin. I am diabetic and elderly, living on Social Security of $1,171 each month, after my Medicare and Medicare Advantage premiums are deducted. I am very thankful for both Social Security and Medicare.
I am prescribed two different insulins. I pay a co-pay $135 each month for one kind (my insurance pays another $432) and my co-pay for the second one just increased in December, from $45 to $245 per month (with my insurance plan paying another $209.) Why?
Insulin was first used as medication for diabetes in 1921. What new research and development costs have suddenly justified the cost to jump from $45 to $245?
Nelda Bishop, Bountiful
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