John: Have you ever priced each of your meds at a local, small-town pharmacy? You might be very pleasantly surprised!

I have two scripts. Each was around $120/month at the so-called "discount" stores. Guess what? At the local pharmacy in Evansville they are $11.09 and $11.59. That's less than 1/10th!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It's also well below a $15.00 copay.

Seriously, John, price your meds locally and let me know what you find!

When people chose to get their prescriptions filled through the mail or via the internet because of financial costs, they lose out on the incredibly VALUABLE information pharmacists provide about the proper taking of any particular drug, the side effects, and even noticing drug interactions with other prescriptions that can literally be deadly to the customer. Small, local pharmacies aren't inefficient nor more expensive unless you are only looking at the up-front financial costs rather than the long-term consequences to your health.

When the going gets tough, the tough self-medicate--why do you think alcohol, cigarettes, sugar and heroine are so popular!

Au contrair, it seems as though J-ville has an abundance of new drug stores, with Walgreens popping up like McDs. Just like banks, insurance and title search companies (now there's a anachronism in the days of "on-line" life!) and their wealth of three little pigs brick buildings, home offices and "worldwide HQs," drug stores (and the drug industry in general) obviously has WAY TOO MUCH MONEY!

John, the three “Cs” of health care reform are: cost, coverage, and choice. Your position today adds a fourth “C’: counterintuitive. Think about what you have just written. You use mail order drug companies because their economies of scale provide the exact drugs more cheaply and efficiently than local pharmacies thus squeezing out local pharmacies. Your actions clearly fill you with deep guilt, but you don’t do the right thing and simply change your behavior and patronize local pharmacies out of a sense of community. Nope. You cry that the “fix” should be for the government to re-write the law to protect local pharmacies (even though the marketplace has shown they are less efficient and contribute, therefore, to higher health care costs.) Then, you perform a psychotropic induced feat: you demand health care reform for all (including illegal aliens). How do you propose to reform healthcare by advocating the government take measures to increase deliberately the cost of healthcare (i.e., inefficient and more expensive local pharmacies)? Should the government demand a minimum mark-up for all drugs, including out-of-state mail order companies—which just drives up the cost of health care? It’s logically untenable—you have to admit that.

Biggirl, There is a huge gap between the pharmacist who, due to his or her own personal convictions, refuses to dispense certain drugs, and whether or not they condemn or look down on the person who chooses to use those drugs. One does not necessarily lead to the other. Don't you have friends who do things in which you choose not to participate? And yet they are still your friends? We were not made to be clones of each other. We all have value. It's sad that you seem to feel diminished by your birth control choice--or that you may have been treated badly by a pharmacist because of it. That's not okay. I am strongly pro-life, but you are a life, too, and I hope you know that not all pro-lifers are angry. And if I misunderstood your post, then feel free to disregard. :0)

Ever thought that the laws that protect the freedom of pharmacists -- and therefore allow them to lord over their customers -- might have something to do with this? I'd just prefer to get my birthcontrol from someone who doesn't raise his eyebrows at me -- or worse yet refuse to give it to me.

I'm sorry, John. I knew it was you I was addressing. Just lost my head there for a minute. :0)

Steve, We are fortunate in Brodhead to have Pinnow Pharmacy, owned by our very own Mayor Doug, and affectionately known as "Doug's Drugs." Without Pinnow, we'd have to drive to Monroe or Janesville for prescriptions, or order them for mail delivery. It is unfortunate that small towns are losing so many of their long-time cornerstones, like their pharmacies. Sad to see it happening. Thanks, Doug, for keeping your doors open!