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Lawsuit based on maximizing profit

This past session the Minnesota Legislature passed the Alec Smith Insulin Affordability Act, a law that provides emergency insulin supplies to diabetics who can’t afford the catastrophically high price charged by the big pharmaceutical companies that make it. The law went into effect on Wednesday.

Also on Wednesday, a lawsuit was filed by the group Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA), to overturn the law. The PhRMA group claims the law is unconstitutional because it requires them to give their product to Minnesotans for free, without compensation from the state. That’s an unconstitutional “taking.”

Talk about chutzpah! The only reason the state had to pass this law was because for the past couple of decades, the Big Pharma companies have been cranking up the price of insulin — which is being made and packaged about the same way it has been for years past — to the point where a diabetic patient without insurance is unable to afford the life-saving medicine. That’s what happened to Alec Smith, who lost coverage on his parents’ health insurance, and started to ration his insulin between paydays because he couldn’t afford the $1,300 a month cost.

Talk about “taking.” Pharmaceutical companies have been taking more and more from diabetic patients, earning big profits. Now that the state is forcing them to give back a little to help the patients they have impoverished, they cry foul and file a lawsuit.

We hope the courts quickly punt this suit to the curb where it belongs.

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