Price cap on Embrel will mostly benefit insurance companies

Re: “Enbrel: State to cap price of arthritis drug” Feb. 24 letter to the editor

The Enbrel price cap proposed by the Patient Accountability Board is more likely to hurt patients than help them. Though well-intended, it is basic economics that price caps often lead to shortages.

In a complex health care system, those shortages may show up in many ways.

Patients may lose access to Enbrel, be pushed to use less effective alternative treatments, or be forced to purchase Enbrel at full price in other states.

Since “middlemen” actually pay Amgen for the drug, insurance companies and pharmacy benefit managers — not patients — will benefit from a lower price when a patient has insurance that covers prescriptions with only a copay.

Enbrel can be a life-changing treatment.

To make Enbrel more affordable for patients, the Patient Accountability Board or the Colorado legislature should consider other options.

One is to limit the cost passed on to patients, as for insulin.

A second is to push Amgen to increase the financial assistance it provides to patients who use Enbrel.

These solutions would directly benefit patients by making Enbrel more affordable.

— Robert Newkirk, Evergreen

Divine disagreement

Re: “Divine court decisions?” Feb. 24 letter to the editor

“No god of any religion has ever come down to speak to us,” writes the letter’s author.

That is unless you count the second person of the Holy Trinity, who became man and walked among us, teaching us about his heavenly Father. Catholics certainly believe this, and it is one of the tenets that none of the Protestants threw out in their protests to start new denominations. The letter writer doesn’t have to believe that, but his statement is patently wrong.

— Donna Jorgenson Farrell, Broomfield

Recognize another harm from the internet

There is increasing discussion regarding the harm of social media, and I applaud this. However, there is additional content that is perhaps more addictive and destructive: pornography.

Internet pornography is almost 100% male-dominant and typically very abusive to females. A high percentage of males use pornography, according to Fight The New Drug (FTND), a non-religious movement to fight the damage that porn is causing in our culture.

Fortunately, our movie theaters do not allow young people under 17 to watch R-rated movies. However, young people can watch XXX-rated material anytime they want to on their smartphones.

Very few are talking about porn addiction; it is past time we do so to protect everyone, especially our young people who are experiencing increasingly high rates of depression and suicide.

— Mark Ackermann, Erie

Help consumers fight fraud

It is quite apparent that a massive amount of fraud is occurring. What is also abundantly apparent is the abject failure of internet providers and appropriate government agencies to develop a comprehensive fraud prevention program that focuses on blocking fraudulent emails on the internet from the originating sources. Fraudulent emails should be forwarded to a central clearing house that will shut down the pertinent accounts. In my own experience, neither Xfinity nor the Federal Communication Commission has any coherent plan that would effectively deal with the fraud. In fact, both of these organizations failed to acknowledge or even answer my inquiries regarding the improvement of fraud detection and remedies. In the case of Xfinity, the response was almost reminiscent of 1950s technology that bordered on the absurd.

Internet providers have an inherent responsibility to reduce fraud that their technology facilitates by their complacency. Whether they want to realize it or not, this complacency results in facilitating criminal enterprises that have a substantial adverse impact on consumers.

— Mark Boyko, Parker