By Herbert Vego
DO you think that we senior citizens enjoy the privilege of buying prescribed medicines at discounted prices? In the sense of paying a lesser amount than the younger patients, yes.
But as to whether we “enjoy” in the more familiar meaning of the word – which is to derive pleasure from something – we don’t. Sickness is never enjoyable, no matter how cheaper the medicines we take. A truly healthy person spends no money on medicine.
Unfortunately, we have no better choice whenever we need to be dependent on “maintenance”. The most we can do is minimize our afflictions at the least possible cost. To some job retirees or those with no sufficient income to lean on, this means relying on well-off children, grandchildren or charitable institutions.
Some people wrongly think we seniors are luckier because with a doctor’s prescription, we are entitled to a 20 percent discount on medicine price on top of value-added tax (VAT) exemption. I used to think so, too, considering the almost 30 percent cut on the original price.
In the past 12 years – counting from 2010 when I turned 60 — I have had second thoughts as to whether the advantages outweigh the disadvantages. If truth be told, we would rather be free from diseases. It’s freedom from sickness that would enable us to buy nutritious food and supplements that promote better health without “side effects”.
Secondly, it’s not really true that we seniors get special treatment in the hospitals and drugstores. They tend to squeeze more money from us because we spend more days on confinement and more money on medical and surgical procedures.
Ask friends undergoing chemotherapy and dialysis. They would say it’s the price, not the disease, killing them.
Under the law (RA 9247), in addition to drug discounts, we are supposed to be entitled to free medical, dental, diagnostic and laboratory services in all government facilities. But these free services are not always available.
And since it’s never comfortable waiting within the long line of patients begging for attention in government facilities, the ones with money tend to go to private laboratories.
It is ironic that we senior citizens or our authorized representatives spend longer time than other customers behind the counter. This is especially true in drugstores where only one window is open to a long line of senior customers, where we have to present a doctor’s prescription, an ID from the Office of Senior Citizens Affairs (OSCA), and a senior citizens’ booklet on which the sales clerk lists the prescribed drugs.
Without a doctor’s prescription, we get no discount on over-the-counter drugs. Sad to say, unfortunately, consulting with a private doctor to be prescribed a drug for colds, flu or cough could be more expensive than the cost of the medicine. Consultation fees now range from three to five hundred pesos.
The smaller drugstores circumvent the law by slapping higher prices on medicines sold to senior citizens so that, when discounted, they don’t reflect the true discount.
However, their seemingly valid excuse is that, unlike their bigger competitors who place bigger orders, they buy the same products in smaller volume from the same suppliers at higher wholesale prices.
Then, too, bigger drug stores do not sell the cheaper generic formulas on the “out of stock” alibi. Common sense tells us that they earn more from pushing the more expensive branded ones.
They are also good at finding “defects”. There was a time when a sales lady name-plated Geelyn would not honor my senior citizen’s ID because my doctor had written only the brand name, omitting its generic name, on the prescription sheet.
“Look,” I argued while leafing through my OSCA booklet detailing my past purchases of the same medicine. “I could die of high blood pressure arguing with you. It’s clear what the doctor prescribed.”
To push that blood pressure down, I walked across the street and got better treatment from a smaller pharmacy.
