briefing notes

Our unsustainable patchwork coverage for prescription drugs that is “fragmented, uneven, unequal and unfair,” according to the Advisory system cannot be fixed by Council on Implementing National Pharmacare.1 adding another patch • Canadians are struggling to afford life-saving and life- sustaining drugs, leading to thousands of preventable • Lobby groups for the pharmaceutical and insurance deaths. [...] Finding the fiscal room for public pharmacare is not • Relative to countries with public pharmacare, Canadian prices are over 50 per cent higher for top- difficult selling brand name drugs7, and 61 per cent higher for primary care drugs used to treat common illnesses.8 • The International Monetary Fund and the U. [...] Gradually expanding the list of drugs covered • The Advisory Council calculated that public to create a comprehensive public pharmacare system pharmacare would save Canadians $5 billion per (covering 87 per cent of all prescriptions) will cost $15 year in drug costs relative to the status quo, due to billion per year, according to the Hoskins report. [...] There is strong popular CONCLUSION support for public pharmacare and a clear path Your constituents are counting on you to stand up to to get there pharmaceutical and insurance industry pressure and champion a universal, public, single-payer pharmacare system, like the one outlined in Bill C-340. [...] consensus” among both popular and expert opinion in favour of a public pharmacare system, rooted in “a Further information is available at strongly held, shared belief that everyone in Canada publicpharmacare.ca should have access to prescription drugs based on their need and not their ability to pay, and delivered in a manner that is fair and sustainable.” • Numerous polls before and since show t.