CDC: Upward of 9 million cut corners on drugs due to cost

What they found: Income, insurance and disability status were among the biggest determinants of whether a person misused drugs as a cost-saving strategy in 2021, per the CDC report, which focused on retail prices and medication adherence.

• The percentage of adults who stinted on drugs to reduce costs fell as family incomes rose.
• Adults with disabilities (20%) were nearly three times more likely than non-disabled adults (7.1%) to misuse their medication to reduce costs.
• Uninsured Americans (22.9%) were 3.5 times more likely to do it than those with private health insurance (6.5%).
• 11.4% with other health coverage did not take their medications as prescribed followed by 8% of Medicaid recipients.

Between the lines: While the average prescription price didn’t change between 2020 and 2021, out-of-pocket spending for prescription medications jumped 4.8% to $63 billion in the second year of the pandemic.