The cost of medical care is outrageous. Health insurance premiums, co-pays, professional fees, inpatient hospital charges, and prescription drug prices have reached ridiculous levels. Mr. and Mrs. Joe Public have no control over most of these costs, but they shop around for any savings they can find. One place I found savings was changing to a mail order prescription service. When I went on Medicare, I was taking 13 different medications and my wife was on 12. To decide what prescription drug plan to choose, I looked at the Medicare Part D website, entered our 25 meds into their plan selection program, and chose Humana Enhanced Prescription Drug Plan.
At first, I chose a mail order pharmacy provider, but after a year of daily badgering, repeated phone calls, and asking if we wanted drug XYZ refilled, I changed to WalMart pharmacy where I felt I had better control of the situation. For two years, I made two or three visits a week to WalMart to pick up prescriptions and spent more than $3000 a year on co-pays and uncovered drug expenses. I obviously made a wrong choice.
Finally, after a lot of deliberation, I went back to a mail order provider, but somehow I found one that did everything online, didn’t call me every day and had costs that were a fraction of what I was paying at WalMart. Besides that, they were very prompt getting drugs refilled so I never ran out of meds, and routine meds were dispensed with a three months’ supply. The expense to me for all but two of my drugs was zero, na da, zip, nothing! This pharmacy is called CenterWell mail order pharmacy. The most expensive drug at WalMart cost me $130 every three months. At CenterWell that same drug is $20.04 every three months. That’s quite a discount.
That’s what I did to reduce our medical expenses. Other folks, though, don’t have that option. Many seniors can’t afford a Part D plan so they go uninsured. The few patients I had without prescription drug coverage got their prescriptions either from the VA Hospital or from a mail order company in either Canada, Mexico, or elsewhere. A Canadian pharmacy provider was the more frequently used foreign provider. The patients who used Canadian providers saved a considerable amount of money and felt confident the quality of drug they received was comparable to that they received from US sources. In fact, Canadian mail order drugs cost usually half of what US pharmacies charged.
“Technically, importing unapproved foreign prescription drugs into the U.S. is illegal under federal law.” The reason for this is that Canadian drugs are not US FDA approved and do not bear specific US labeling. The illegality has been very loosely enforced because punishment would be dealt upon little old silver-haired ladies.
Recently, however, foreign mail order pharmacies have been affected by the Trump administration’s crack down on imports. As of October 22nd, medications mailed from other nations will be required to “go through a customs process requiring a licensed customs broker and a financial guarantee.” This has not been done before, but is part of an effort to keep illegal drugs from quietly infiltrating our country. Pharmacy benefit managers, however, aren’t the party responsible for illicit drug distribution, but they get swept up with the new policy.
The worst that could happen is the import of prescription drugs could be stopped completely which would hurt consumers in the US and force them to look elsewhere for a prescription drug plan. In 2020, it was estimated that 2.3 million Americans bought prescription drugs from other countries. “Canadian pharmacies sell maintenance medications such as those to prevent blood clots and treat diabetes and high cholesterol.” But they don’t sell controlled substances which avoids multiple potentially problematic situations.
How this will shake out is anyone’s guess right now, but several members of the House of Representatives want to vote to delay implementation of the policy. Putting these drugs through customs will delay delivery or not allow delivery at all. This will impose burdens on consumers either of a financial or medical nature. Hopefully the 2.3 M people affected by this policy will be informed and plan for another way to get their drugs.
Reference: Dotinga R. US to Crack Down on Mail-Order Canadian drug Imports: What you need to know. medscape.com 2026 October 8.
Www.google.com/canadian-mail-order-drugs.
