Generic drugs changing the economics of treating chronically ill patients, US study finds

As the USA seeks to expand health care coverage to more citizens without adding burdensome costs, researchers from Harvard University, Brigham and Women's Hospital and CVS Caremark (NYSE: CVS) reported that preventative health care may be significantly less costly than previously thought, due to expanded use of cost-effective generic medications for the treatment and prevention of chronic disease.

A study released in the July issue of Health Affairs concludes that preventive health care is considerably less costly than previous industry estimates, because earlier studies projected financial impact based on costs of branded medications. Today, the cost to consumers and the health care system are significantly lower because generics are broadly available for most chronic diseases, the researchers said.

Using generics reduced costs to as little as 2%-20% of original spend