[Pheddytrourry]

When a nation goes into economic crisis the paradigm to which its people have become accustomed begins to deteriorate. Access to critical supplies becomes difficult, sometimes immediately. In the case of Greece, which has been dealing with a loss of confidence in its debt instruments and economic policy, the collapse of life as Greeks know it has taken place over the last several years.

While we have been fortunate enough to avoid as severe a calamity here in the United States, many of the forecasts put forth by ourselves and others regarding the effects of an economic collapse are already taking place in Europe, namely Greece. In the midst of the Greek panic in 2010, for example, as Greece’s meltdown was in full swing and the people scrambled to get out of paper currencies, the price of gold, which was trading for around $1100 an ounce in the global commodity exchange marketplace, soared to over $1700 an ounce on the streets of Greece. In recent months, as Greece implements austerity measures and the unemployment rate sky rockets, its people have lost the ability to engage in traditional commerce because, simply put, they have no tangible income or money to do so. As a result, we’ve begun seeing a barter society emerge all over the country, making it possible for some people to directly exchange labor for consumptive goods and service.




When things get bad – and they will – the most essential items necessary for survival will disappear first. As currencies collapse, financial market destabilize and economies come to a standstill, critical supplies like food and medicine will become difficult to acquire at any price. This is exactly what is now taking place in Greece, where access to life-saving drugs and even common over-the-counter medicines like aspirin is becoming a tragedy where the losses will be measured not in Dollars or Euros, but lives.

For patients and pharmacists in financially stricken Greece, even finding aspirin has turned into a headache.

Mina Mavrou, who runs a pharmacy in a middle-class Athens suburb, spends hours each day pleading with drugmakers, wholesalers and colleagues to hunt down medicines for clients. Life-saving drugs such as Sanofi (SAN)’s blood-thinner Clexane and GlaxoSmithKline Plc (GSK)’s asthma inhaler Flixotide often appear as lines of crimson data on pharmacists’ computer screens, meaning the products aren’t in stock or that pharmacists can’t order as many units as they need.


When we see red, we want to cry,” Mavrou said. “The situation is worsening day by day.”

The 12,000 pharmacies that dot almost every street corner in Greek cities are the damaged capillaries of a complex system for getting treatment to patients. The Panhellenic Association of Pharmacists reports shortages of almost half the country’s 500 most-used medicines.

…

“It would be unrealistic to deny that there are many difficulties regarding all public services due to the financial crisis,” Nicolaos Polyzos, secretary general of the Ministry of Health, wrote in a response to McKee’s article posted on the ministry’s website.



T he reasons for the shortages are complex. One major cause is the Greek government, which sets prices for medicines. As part of an effort to cut its own costs, Greece has mandated lower drug prices in the past year. That has fed a secondary market, drug manufacturers contend, as wholesalers sell their shipments outside the country at higher prices than they can get within Greece.

Strained government finances only make matters worse. Wholesalers and pharmacists say the system suffers from a lack of liquidity, as public insurers delay payments to pharmacies, which in turn can’t pay suppliers on time.


T his is what happens when a country’s economy falls apart. In a report from 2010, economist John Williams warned that a hyperinflationary environment in the US would not only cause food disruptions, but also disrupt the regular flow of commerce. And, while Greece may not specifically be experiencing a hyperinflationary environment (yet), an economic collapse resulting from a debt crisis has similar consequences as evidenced above.

But such a thing couldn’t happen in the United States, right? As we approach yet another debt ceiling this month, requiring some $1 trillion dollars just to keep the system from seizing up like an engine that has run out of oil, our elected officials and leading economic decision makers will ensure we avoid such an outcome.

Or will they?

How willing are you to trust the health of your family to the very individuals and corporations who are responsible for causing the crisis in the first place?

Like Greece, we will see a continued deterioration of basic services here at home. We may be able to print trillions upon trillions of dollars, but eventually those dollars will become worthless and no one will accept them as a trusted currency. This means that all of the food we import from other countries, the drugs we buy from pharmaceutical companies, and the oil we buy from the middle east, will become difficult, if not impossible, to acquire.

Now is the time to get prepared. Food, of course, is one of the first essential preparedness items to stockpile. But how many have given thought to life saving medications? If you have someone with a medical condition in your family, how will you gain access to that medicine when it’s no longer available at your local pharmacy. We recommend taking steps immediately to secure at least a 3 – 6 month supply of the drugs you or your family members need to survive (and to consider proper off-grid storage methods for those requiring refrigeration). Additionally, we strongly encourage you to consider adding Antibiotics for SHTF Planning to your stockpiles, because if things get so bad that you are unable to find medicines like penicillin or cipro at a local pharmacy, you can be assured that no one on the street will be

[fapourfasiark]

Primary function of government:
1) pretend to fail. Money is always there for the elites but not for the peasant class.
2) confiscation of wealth. Or I say wealth distribution until the elites ran out of other people's money..

[Paladin]

http://www.shtfplan.com/emergency-pr...reece_01112012

[DrazAdwamoi]

I have plenty of elderberry around the house...along with motrin, aspirin for the common cold..bandages and most important of all, my passport and physical gold and silver in case SHTF

Sambucus
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sambucus

[RagonaCon]

On 60 Minutes last night there was a segment on the only community (i.e., not for profit) hospital in Las Vegas dropping their out patient (read charity) cancer ward, and how a lot of patients were left to die. They were given a list of private hospitals, but obviously they could not afford to pay (some drugs were like $50k/month). In the end some got picked up, and new charity clinics are springing up. One died (he had lung cancer).

[galaktiusman]

Healthcare in Vegas rivals to that of third world. I am so glad that you point that one out..In the end, it is all about who you know.

[WaicurtaitfuT]

On 60 Minutes last night there was a segment on the only community (i.e., not for profit) hospital in Las Vegas dropping their out patient (read charity) cancer ward, and how a lot of patients were left to die. They were given a list of private hospitals, but obviously they could not afford to pay (some drugs were like $50k/month). In the end some got picked up, and new charity clinics are springing up. One died (he had lung cancer).

Too bad they spent all their "charity" money on illegals already. F*** the Americans - Mexicans come first in America.

[jesyflowers]

Klobuchar warns drugmakers over tactics that limit supplies


U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar is taking on the pharmaceutical industry over the problem of drug shortages -- charging that drugmakers limit production of low-profit medicines and sometimes pay manufacturers of generic drugs to keep cheap alternatives off the market.

Klobuchar gathered experts on the issue Thursday at Fairview Southdale Hospital in Edina, where patients such as Mary McHugh Morrison have struggled to obtain needed medications.

McHugh Morrison said shortages of the chemotherapy drug Doxil have at times delayed and complicated her treatment for peritoneal cancer.
"To hear the drug I was counting on to save my life wasn't available was terrifying," McHugh Morrison said.

Klobuchar is pressing legislation to reduce the number of drugs in short supply, which has tripled since 2005, from 61 to more than 200. One bill the Minnesota Democrat introduced would require faster notification by drug companies when shortages loom.

Reasons for shortages range from a lack of raw materials to financial decisions by companies to regulatory barriers that don't necessarily improve drug safety but do slow production.

"Whatever the cause, the results are clear and we see them time and time again with our patients," said Klobuchar, who held a similar event to highlight drug shortages last June.

Another concern Klobuchar cited is "pay-for-delay" deals in which brand-name drugmakers pay generic drug companies, often via lawsuit settlements, to keep cheaper generics off the market for a time.

A report by the Federal Trade Commission last summer noted 28 such deals in the last fiscal year and estimated that they delay the availability of generic drugs by 17 months.

At Thursday's event, FTC Chairman Jon Leibowitz called these "sweetheart deals" and the "most abusive practice in health care today," though he acknowledged that some courts have found them legal.

Drug companies argue that these deals actually eliminate legal battles that can delay the arrival of generics on the market. Inquiries to an industry spokesman were not returned Thursday afternoon.

A bill to stop such deals advanced through the U.S. House two years ago, Leibowitz said, and Klobuchar helped get it through the Senate Judiciary Committee. The Congressional Budget Office estimated that the bill could reduce federal deficits over the next 10 years by $2.67 billion, largely by making more generics available for the Medicare program for seniors.

Minnesota has supported other states in lawsuits against "pay-for-delay" arrangements, according to state Attorney General Lori Swanson, who also spoke Thursday. One, she said, targeted a brand-name company that used a $350 million payment to extend its monopoly on a drug and reap an extra $1.6 billion in profits.

Pay-for-delay tactics can aggravate overall drug shortages, said Stephen Schondelmeyer, an expert in pharmaceutical economics at the University of Minnesota. If generic drugmakers know they can reap multimillion-dollar settlements for trying to replicate top brand-name drugs, they'll feel no urgency to invest in needed but low-profit medications, he said.

At Fairview Health Services' cancer clinics, drug shortages have only worsened over the past year, said Darcy Malard Johnson, Fairview's oncology pharmacy program manager.

McHugh Morrison took to calling every friend and pharmacy she knew when her local provider ran out of Doxil. She generally found it, sometimes in other states, but once last summer she received a dose a week late. After progress in beating her cancer, one tumor started to grow back.

"It was a delayed dose," she said. "[My doctor] thinks that's why my tumor started to grow."

http://www.startribune.com/lifestyle...137209303.html

[CicyHannyCeli]

http://www.shtfplan.com/emergency-pr...reece_01112012

bump

[Z1IRo4Ap]

On 60 Minutes last night there was a segment on the only community (i.e., not for profit) hospital in Las Vegas dropping their out patient (read charity) cancer ward, and how a lot of patients were left to die. They were given a list of private hospitals, but obviously they could not afford to pay (some drugs were like $50k/month). In the end some got picked up, and new charity clinics are springing up. One died (he had lung cancer).

With or without the $50,000/month cell poison treatment, you are going to die of lung cancer in almost every case. No matter who pays for it, it would be better to save the money instead of giving it to the criminals in charge.

[JeremyBalll]

As I understood it Greek Doctors and nurses are working only during emergencies, due to lack of funds. Yet the authorities use the latest bailout money to buy tanks..unreal..

[Bbjhjxfy]

As I understood it Greek Doctors and nurses are working only during emergencies, due to lack of funds. Yet the authorities use the latest bailout money to buy tanks..unreal..

Well when you don't pay what you owe, tanks can be very useful...

[SAUNDERSAN]

A report by the Federal Trade Commission last summer noted 28 such deals in the last fiscal year and estimated that they delay the availability of generic drugs by 17 months.

At Thursday's event, FTC Chairman Jon Leibowitz called these "sweetheart deals" and the "most abusive practice in health care today," though he acknowledged that some courts have found them legal.

Drug companies argue that these deals actually eliminate legal battles that can delay the arrival of generics on the market. Inquiries to an industry spokesman were not returned Thursday afternoon.










Just when you think it can't get any worse .......it dose

The fact that this practice has been given legal sanction and protection shows two things

1). Those that run these corps are full bore Sociopaths who enjoy killing innocent people for profit

2). The legal system is a absolute joke when it comes to "justice"

[casinobonusnolimit]

there justice for them ... then the hardcore justice for the every day people