The Mark Cuban Cost Plus Drugs Company (MCCPDC) is a registered pharmaceutical wholesaler and purchases drugs directly from manufacturers, bypassing middlemen to lower the price of more than 100 medications, it said in a statement.
For example, the leukemia drug imatinib is priced at $47 a month on MCCPDC compared to the $9,657 retail price.
MCCPDC CEO Alex Oshmyansky reached out to Cuban with an idea for a low-cost generic drug company in a cold email. It was launched in January last year. They were motivated in part by “Pharma Bro” Martin Shrkeli’s outrage-producing price hike of the lifesaving drug Daraprim from $13.50 to $750 per tablet while Shrkeli was CEO of Turing Pharmaceuticals. Cuban told Forbes last year the pricing for generic drugs was “ridiculous.” He said he decided to put his name on the company to “show capitalism can be compassionate and to send the message I am all in.” It’s not clear how much he had invested in the company.
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Reblog to save someone an entire paycheck, or more, on the pharmaceuticals they need.
Gods, I want this to be true so badly.
It is true. Mark Cuban is doing this in part because he wants to run for President in 2024 if Biden doesn’t run again (Mark ran in 2020). He’s a Democrat and “I personally made medication affordable” will give him an immense edge. He’s far from perfect but this is a good thing he’s doing. Also he seems to genuinely believe this stuff, but either way, site’s up and operational and you can start any time.
just so people understand what a big deal this is, i ran some fast price comparisons. goodrx is an app that offers discounts on medications for which you have to pay out of pocket, whether because your insurance doesn’t cover them or because you don’t have insurance. if you don’t have insurance, goodrx is often about as good as it gets, so i’m using their prices for my comparison.
please note that prices are location dependent on goodrx—it shows you the options at pharmacies near your location. i’m in pittsburgh, pa; if you’re in a different part of the country and you try this, you may get slightly (or wildly) different numbers.
fluoxetine is generic prozac. thirty 20mg capsules costs $12.80 at my cheapest local pharmacy. costplus has it for $3.90.
atorvastatin is generic lipitor. thirty 40mg tablets is $10.95 at my cheapest local pharmacy. costplus has it for $4.20.
omeprazole is generic prilosec. thirty 20mg capsules is $13.90 at the cheapest local pharmacy; $4.20 at costplus.
aripiprazole is generic abilify. thirty 10mg tablets is $17.73 at the cheapest local pharmacy (and $260.60 at the most expensive—and that’s with a discount, still, yikes); $6.00 at costplus.
lamotrigine xr is generic lamictal xr. thirty 25mg tablets is $36.59 at the cheapest local pharmacy; $8.40 at costplus.
maybe that doesn’t seem like a huge discount, but the goodrx prices change *all the time*—last time i used it to buy fluoxetine, which was in the last couple of years, it was $31. also, many people are on multiple medications, or have multiple people in a household taking multiple medications, and $5 off every prescription adds up real fast.
this is an objectively fantastic thing and a huge deal, and i hope they’re wildly successful.
