OT: Best Pharmacy?

I think it's a pretty localized issue. We're "forced" by my insurance to use a CVS in a Target store (or go mail-order). They're often out of more common drugs and have to order anything unusual, even things I've used for some time (like my eye drops). It's not usually a big deal because they order stuff well before I'm out.

GoodRX.com is the place to go to find the cheapest drugs. Works great! My insurance company has their own deals, so I don't use the site, though.

There are a couple of rule of thumb with the Daily Wail.

Firstly remember that they have two categories for things: "cancer causing" and "cancer curing". Because that's the stories that their C2/D/E "worried well" audience will buy.

Secondly, if a story "surprises" you, then check it elsewhere. It will probably be found to be false.

One example is of a "cancer causing" substance which they wailed "why haven't the EU bureaucrats banned it?". They carefully forgot to mention that it /had/ been banned 5 years earlier.

From what Mr Thompson writes, it is nothing to do with "socialised medicine", since the antisocialised medicine in the US also has any such problem.

It is all over in the news, that was just one example of many. I wouldn't have brought it up otherwise. It's just that most medical journals require (expensive) subscription to read the whole article. I used to have access a lot but now being out of med-tech, not anymore.

Now you'll probably say that the BMJ is infested with ruthless capitalists :-)

It generally doesn't. I live in the US for a long time, have often helped elderly by picking up their prescriptions because they couldn't and never seen one instance of a drug being out of stock. It's not that it never happens, it just doesn't to the almost epidemic propoportions it sometimes does in countries with socialized medicine. I have also lived in Europe which enables me to compare hands-on, not just by hear-say.

There is price gouging, pretty much in all countries. In the US shenanigans like that can land people in prison, and do. IIRC Mr.Shkreli is doing seven years in Club Fed.

The problem with socialised medicine is that the joggers end up supporting the morbidly obese - and in the West at least there's an epidemic of this avoidable condition. There is less incentive to keep yourself in shape when you know you have access to free healthcare and can let yourself go.

IIRC he's in Canada anyway so what would he know about the UK situation? He's demonstrated f*ck-all knowledge of anything worthwhile AFAIK. Can you not access meds by mail from Mexico, Jim? AIUI, they're much more informal about such matters there - and a damn sight cheaper too.

By that impressive "reasoning", there should be less morbid obesity in the US.

But there is *more* morbid obesity in the US, presumably on the principle that "I've paid for insurance, so I'm going to get my monies' worth".

As accurate and attentive as ever, we see.

What does your favourite media source, Russia Today, have to say about the situation in Russia?

The US has much different demographics than many other places. When pacific islanders and africans and native americans get access to cheap cheesecake and cheeseburgers and high-fructose corn syrup treats, things they were not evolved to process, bad things happen.

The same thing is happening in the UK: more obesity and related diseases, especially among ethnic minorities. I think that northern europeans are uniquely adapted to a high-meat, high-dairy diet.

People in general aren't well adapted to cheap food and typing/clicking all day. They used to have to work or hunt for their food.

The US has more overweight people than the UK, but not that much.

"Overweight" here is defined as BMI > 25, but people with BMI around

For some reason, California has few obese people, and they tend to be ethnic minorities. I'm sometimes shocked by the people that I see in, say, the Chicago airport.

At the risk of pointing out the obvious, no one anywhere on the planet evolved to eat cheeseburgers and cheesecake! :-D

That's true for most people. I'm sceptical that there are sufficient to completely skew the stats.

Hell's teeth, even 35 years ago a colleague (who travelled the US "leaking" a semiconductor company's status to other such companies) made a telling comment. He noted that if you got into a conversation with a /thin/ woman in a hotel bar, she was probably a pro.

Yes, we too are rapidly becoming more podgy. Type 2 diabetes is constantly being discussed, and there are many TV programmes about it and dietary lessons/techniques (and some of the programmes are usefully good).

Nonetheless in this as in other cases, the US leads and others follow.

But of course, my main point was to point out the lack of critical thinking in our anonymous "Putin's useful fool's" statements.

Same definition here. But I've never seen anything about

When I go to poorer parts of the nearby city, I see worryingly many "type 2 diabetes on legs" people.

I recently read "The Long Weekend", about the invention of the weekend in England. Before public transportation, most people worked six days a week and and lived near to, and walked to work. Most people married someone who grew up within walking distance.

Unions claim they invented the weekend, but they are wrong. Railroads invented the weekend.

And food was expensive. Railroads fixed that too.

We certainly lead in the number of Native Americans.

That was surprisingly recent in some cases.

In the early 80s I had a friend in her early 20s that was a perfectly pleasant unassuming "salt of the earth type". It took me quite a while to realise that she could remember /every/ time she had gone from the town we lived in to the county capital 10 miles away.

Even by the "100 years is a long time / 100 miles is a long way" distinction, that came as a surprise.

Food (and /stuff/) is remarkably cheap now. IIRC food was 30% of take home pay when I was a kid; nowadays it is 10-15%.

But over here that was to do with lorries, ships and intensive/battery farming.

He wasn't convicted of price gouging since there is no such law, except in a few states like Florida and it applies only to emergency situations like hurricanes. He was convicted of defrauding his investors. "...three of eigh t counts of securities and wire fraud charges..."

Well...next time you're in Manila, have a heaping dish of this delicious pagpag. That'll keep you lean.

And got seven years where others got a slap on the wrist. Look at the big picture. Many Mafia bosses were never convicted for the countless murdes, assaults and whatnot because they had tons of money and thus the best lawyers. So they couldn't get convictions. They were convicted of tax fraud and received max time. That's how it's done.

What little incentive there was has been totally scrapped in Obamacare. For example, there is no longer a non-smoker discount which was available on the private plans since 20 years. That's beyond stupid.

No, that's not how it's done. The seven years for three counts securities a nd wire fraud is extremely light. If he gets caught again it will NOT be li ght.

"Mail and wire fraud: Both carry a maximum prison sentence of up to 20 year s. If the scheme also involved a bank, the potential fine increases to up t o $100,000: [18 U.S.C. Section 1343] Securities fraud: The Court may order a large fine calculated based on the amount of money that was fraudulently obtained and/or a maximum period of i ncarceration of up to 25 years in prison: [18 U.S.C. Section 1348]"

The U.S. aspires to be a nation of laws, and that means the ulterior types of sentencing you suggest are strictly prohibited, as well as dumb because an extraordinarily harsh sentence is a basis for a probably successful appe al and re-sentencing. Shkreli will be out in under three years.

There may not be a non-smoker discount, but there certainly is a smoker penalty, which is far more equitable to the insurance pool.