TOLEDO, Ohio — According to the CDC, 37.3 million Americans have diabetes and their lives depend on using insulin.
As part of President Joe Biden's Build Back Better plan he pushed in 2021, copays for insulin were to be capped at $35 a month starting in 2023.
"Whether you get health insurance through your private policy affordable care act marketplace or through Medicare, nobody is going to pay more than 35 dollars each month for insulin,” Biden said in 2021.
But when Gina Lundquist, who has type 1 diabetes, went to get her first prescription of the year, she thought she "would be benefiting from Biden's $35 insulin, but it cost me $167."
The Inflation Reduction Act capped insulin prices at $35 per month for only Medicare recipients and people like Lundquist were left out.
"Insulin is just expensive in general and I feel like it really shouldn't be that expensive," Lundquist said. "I need insulin every day to survive and to just feel normal."
Chuck Riepenhoff, a clinical pharmacist with ProMedica, said insurances are too complex to offer the same price to everyone.
"The insurance and the list of insulins that they cover definitely change, not necessarily just year to year but maybe even within the year," Riepenhoff said.
Bidens push for lower prescription prices is now influencing drugmakers to follow through. Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk have recently announced slashes to their sky-high insulin prices.
After paying for insulin for 22 years, Lundquist is looking forward to the change.
"If this price cut does happen that's going to be life-changing for me, I'm going to save hundreds of dollars and that's money that can go towards other diabetic supplies or other bills in general, " she said.