To implement pharmacare, the Liberals will need to negotiate with the provinces, and the mostly Conservative premiers are unlikely to make this easy. The insurance industry also has much to lose.
When codeine became a prescription only drug in 2018, the number of overdoses dropped, our new research shows. But restricting sales of codeine is only one way to reduce harm from opioids.
The 1964 report that paved the way for Canada’s medicare envisaged that after universal coverage for doctors, the next step would be prescription drugs. But that next step hasn’t come.
A new study reveals how many patient groups lobby for new drugs to be funded by public plans in Canada – all while receiving funding from the companies manufacturing the drugs in question.
It takes about three years for safety problems to be identified in new drugs, newer drugs are almost always more expensive, and yet Canadian doctors still hand out hundreds of thousands of samples.
Two community pharmacists suggest a way for improving the palatability of evidence-based universal pharmacare – for those working in health insurance, pharmacy and the pharmaceutical industry.
Insurance companies sometimes try to cut costs by substituting less expensive drugs for a specific drug prescription. That’s raising problems in many cases, and actually causing harm.
The medication landscape is complicated and error-riddled, with very few care providers knowing all the drugs you are taking. Here’s how pharmacists could be the solution.
As Canadians consider possibilities for pharmacare reform in the coming months, they should have access to the best available evidence about how it might work in our country.
The logic behind U.S. president Donald Trump’s proposal that Canada and other countries have been “free-riding” off high prices in the United States is bizarre at best.