The price they pay for drugs

Poorest Americans struggle to afford their prescriptions

The burden of high drug costs weighs most heavily on the sickest Americans.

Drugmakers have raised prices on treatments for life-threatening or chronic conditions like multiple sclerosis, diabetes and cancer. In turn, insurers have shifted more of those costs onto consumers. Saddled with high deductibles and other out-of-pocket costs that expose them to a drug’s rising list price, many people are paying thousands of dollars a month merely to survive.

For more than a year, President Donald Trump and Democrats in Congress have promised to take action on high drug prices, but despite a flurry of proposals, little has changed.

These are the stories of Americans living daily with the reality of high-cost drugs. And there are millions of others just like them.

Skipping drugs she can’t afford

Saundra Johnson, 57, Minneapolis

With an annual income of less than $20,000, Johnson doesn’t come close to being able to afford the 12 medications her doctors have prescribed for congestive heart failure, diabetes and related complications.

She is one of the many who finds herself “in between,” as one of her doctors described it, narrowly missing the requirements for assistance but making too little to afford her prescriptions.

Here’s a rundown of the math: John-