Are You Paying More For Rosuvastatin (Generic Crestor) Than Brand Name Crestor?

The skeptical cardiologist was shocked to hear from a patient last week that she would have to pay considerably more for generic rosuvastatin (GR) than Crestor, its brand name equivalent.
Crestor is the most potent statin we have at lowering LDL (bad) cholesterol, raising HDL (good) cholesterol, and  preventing strokes and heart attacks.  It is also the best tolerated statin in my experience; I use it frequently at low or intermittent dosages in patients who have developed muscle aches on other statins.
In comparison to atorvastatin (Lipitor, the most widely prescribed statin), Crestor is less likely to interact with other medications and (very important for a surprising number of my patients), you can consume grapefruit when taking it.
When a generic (rosuvastatin calcium) of Crestor became available last year I rejoiced, believing that the high cost of Crestor would now drop to the levels we have typically seen with other generic statins.

For example, when Lipitor (atorvastatin, the statin market leader for 20 years) went generic, patients no longer worried about its cost.
Initially it seemed GR was much more affordable for my patients than Crestor, however recently, I have had many of them report a rise in its cost.

Why Would The Generic Cost More Than Crestor?

The reasons for brand name versus generic pricing are many and complex, and they yield insight into the legal machinations that Big Pharma engages in to maintain high patient pharmaceutical costs.
This NY Times piece from July, 2016 reveals  how hard AstraZeneca fought to protect its exclusivity in selling Crestor and to prevent generics from entering the market. AstraZeneca’s last tactic involved a lawsuit claiming that their patent was protected by the orphan drug act. They lost and were heavily criticized:

“This case is not about the medical needs of a small population of pediatric patients with a rare disease,” the F.D.A. and Justice Department said in a brief filed in the lawsuit. “It is about AstraZeneca’s profit-driven desire to substantially extend its virtual monopoly on one of the world’s most popular medicines.”

There are other factors that slow the drop in generic prices. Consumer Reports, writing on the anticipated release of GR in May quoted an expert thusly:

“While some pharmacies drop the price as generics enter the market, others will hold it near the brand-name price as long as possible.” They get away with it, he says, because many customers who have health insurance pay a set co-pay regardless of the retail price. But those consumers who pay the entire cost of the drug themselves because they don’t have insurance or have a high deductible may not see the substantial savings that should come with generic availability.”

What an individual pays for drugs varies wildly depending on their insurance coverage. These costs are extremely hard for a physician to anticipate and rarely reflect the actual cost of drugs. Thus, in America, patients as consumers are often isolated from the true costs of pharmaceuticals to society.
Geo (he who was “on the fence” about taking a statin) asked me the following reasonable question about his GR prescription:

I did not pay anything for the 25 pills, however the paperwork states a cost of $220 if I had to buy this outside of a health insurance plan. Do you know if the health insurance company is being charged the $220, or do they negotiate a lower cost with the manufacturer?