Prescription drug
plan winning praise from many
By
Ave
“This is a program that can help people with
a very serious need to deal with the cost of prescription drugs,” said Nursing
Sister of the Sick Poor Maryan Russo, developer for
healing ministry for diocesan Catholic Charities’ parish social ministry.
“It is a tremendous need and this could do a lot of good for people,” said Mary
Connors, parish outreach coordinator for St. Lawrence the Martyr Church,
Sayville. “We just put the word out last month and we have gotten
15 requests for cards,” Mrs. Connors added.
The card from Ave Maria Pharmacy Services enables the cardholder to
receive discounts as high as 15 percent for brand name prescription medicines
and as high as 35 percent for generic prescriptions from participating
pharmacies.
Sister Maryan noted that she will talk about Ave
Maria Pharmacy Services at a training day Oct. 8 that diocesan Catholic
Charities will offer to parish social ministry offices, their staff, and
volunteers.
‘The price is right’
“The price is right because there is no price,” said Mark Endres of Madison,
Wisconsin, who founded Ave Maria Pharmacy Services three years ago. The cost is
borne largely by the pharmacies themselves that agree to give discounts to
cardholders. Many national drug store
chains accept the card, including CVS, Rite Aid, Eckerd, Kmart, ShopRite, and
Wal-Mart, Mr. Endres said. The cardholder pays no fee for the card
itself, Mr. Endres said. “If parishes or other groups want to order cards,
we’ll send a supply of them at a minimal cost, $25 for 500 cards.” In addition,
parishes or individuals can receive the card free by logging on to Ave Maria
Pharmacy Services’ website and having it printed out.
“I have been working around the country through Catholic Charities, the St.
Vincent de Paul Society, and Catholic hospitals to promote this,” said Mr.
Endres, who is a veteran of 10 years in the field of prescription drug
marketing and insurance.
The program itself is open to all persons regardless of religion. The only
restriction is that the card cannot be used in conjunction with any
prescription insurance card or other discounts. “Right now, cardholders
are purchasing 9,000 prescriptions a month using the card,” Mr. Endres said.
“We are hoping that a year from now the number will be three or four times that
many.” Mr. Endres said that he started Ave Maria “as a way to blend my
Catholic faith with what I do for a living. I came up with the name while
attending a Marian conference at the University of Notre Dame.”
‘National problem’
The program, he said, is a for-profit enterprise. “We get a couple of pennies
per prescription,” which he said comes from pharmacy chains themselves at no
cost to cardholders. Mr. Endres also works full time in the insurance
business. Pharmacies take part in the program, Mr. Endres explained,
because it helps them either to maintain current customers or draw additional
customers. “The Bush Administration has proposed a similar plan for
seniors on Medicare, but it involves a $25 charge to the card holders,” Mr. Endres
said. “Ave Maria costs the cardholders nothing.”
Mr. Endres started the program in response
to a need for people who don’t have health insurance. “You hear the
statistics all the time that 30 to 40 million Americans do not have health
insurance and that 100,000 get dropped out of health insurance every month,” he
said. And even many people with health insurance don’t have coverage for the
cost of prescription medicines.
“It’s a national problem” that parish social ministry offices deal with
regularly, Sister Maryan said. “It’s not just
the elderly. There are people who work part time and employers whose businesses
are too small to offer health insurance and their employees usually don’t make
enough to pay for their own health insurance,” Sister Maryan
said. “You know how expensive
prescriptions can be. If you are already struggling and have to pay for
prescriptions, particularly if you are having health problems, what are you
going to do?” Many people whom parish social ministry offices serve, Sister Maryan noted, either have to forgo medicine they need or
deprive themselves of other necessities to pay for the prescriptions. Because
prescriptions can be so expensive and so many people come for help, parish
social ministry offices are limited in what they can do.“This is one way to help people cope,” Sister Maryan said. Mr. Endres noted that he gets letters from
people who take part in the program. For example, one widow wrote that in less
than a month she has saved more than $50. “Widowed at 61 years of age and
unable to obtain insurance,” she wrote, “this card is a Godsend.”