What happens if you can't afford your medication?

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I can btw, this is not a begging thread, but I'm taking the money from my savings, and I don't always have money in my savings, which has got me pondering.

If I didn't have savings and my asthma medication ran out, is there a scheme where I can buy now, pay later, or is it a case of risking death or needing A&E?

Are there any other life-saving medications you have to pay for, or is it just asthma? I know my mum gets free prescriptions because she needs thyroid medication, but that doesn't seem as serious or life-threatening as asthma to me.

What's the criteria for a medication being free, and why doesn't it seem to make sense?

Yes of course I have but it's about priorities. These medications are vital so it's a non-negotiable expense. As soon as you get paid, the tenner is set aside. Nothing is more important. I was always taught to budget in this way, the non-negotiables are paid first. If you wait to see if there's a tenner left at the end of the month, there never will be. Something always crops up.

You need to see if you are eligible for free prescriptions:

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&cd=&ved=2ahUKEwigsZyexJKSAxW2dUEAHRARMCIQFnoECFYQAQ&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nhsbsa.nhs.uk%2Fhelp-nhs-prescription-costs&usg=AOvVaw227AasUmwluxyaRfYHzkWz&opi=89978449

I'm not sure how one would choose to pay £10 less for heat, as one poster suggested, but I'll try asking OVO if they would mind lowering their prices for me next time I speak to them. If you meant don't heat the house and choose to be cold instead, that would make it worse, not better, because I would then need more inhalers and have a higher risk of infections and death.

When we were in this poistion - we were rationing the heating which is probably why I was getting sick so often and then needing more prescriptions which then struggled to pay for.

Also didn't have pets at that time - got those when our finaces improve - was told at time we shouldn't have had kid but when we did our fiances were fine then life happened and now they almost grown really glad we didn't listen to that. Then we moved to Wales where perscription charges are not a thing.

Thing is for most people it's do without and take risks - and you can get
complacent with chronic conditions - or get the money somehow.

I don't see it changing as it would add to the NHS costs there more likely I think in England to reduce who gets it free rather than expand.

You're talking about budgeting as if sufferers know they have an inhaler and it will need replacing on x date. Again, that is not how asthma works.

If you have an attack that doesn't ease after one puff of your reliever, the advice is to take one puff of a reliever every 30-60 seconds for a maximum of 10 doses. If that still doesn't ease, you call 999, where you are usually advised to take your inhaler every 30 seconds until help arrives or you feel better. One severe attack can use an entire inhaler, and you have no way of planning how many attacks you will have.

If you use a preventative and a reliever in one, the advice is to take one puff every minute for a maximum of 6 doses.

My inhaler can last 2 months, or it can be empty in a few weeks if I catch a cold. I have no way of predicting how long it will last or what date it will need replacing on.

I have a rare condition and don't have to pay for my daily tablet there's a centre for the condition that send them to me. They 'discovered' the drug and there's a handful of people taking it. I do have a prepayment prescription for other monthly meds.

I think it's mainly a practical thing as the GP couldn't prescribe it to me and my condition wouldn't be monitored effectively at the local hospital as they don't understand it. So I get monitored at the centre.

I'd use savings and buy prepay card for a year. It works out same price but its done and paid for

If you budget a tenner a month (actually works out at less than that) for the prepayment certificate then it doesn't matter whether you need one inhaler a month or six. The cost is the same. So when you get paid, set aside a tenner for the certificate before you budget for anything else, then you don't need to worry how many inhalers you'll need that month.

It does look like the pre-paid certificate is now worth getting even for once a month medication - and if you can pay monthly for it which I didn't know before this thread - think many would be better of with it as it would make budgeting easier and take some away the worry of needing more than usual.

A prepaid certificate wouldn't work for me. I typically order my inhaler once every 6 weeks. It can be once a month, or it can stretch as long as two months. If I order one too early because I'm going away and need a spare, I can go as long as 3 months before needing to order one again, but on average, it's once every 6 weeks. A prepaid cert would cost me more in the longrun and I'm trying to reduce my outgoings, not increase them.

This thread was more about sufferers in general than me specifically, and research has been done by asthma charities into why people aren't using the prepaid cert.

The biggest reason is a lack of knowledge. Most sufferers report that it can take more than 6 months from being diagnosed with a chronic condition to being made aware of the prepaid certs, with a big chunk of people only learning about it all because of the questionnaire asking why they don't use it.

The second biggest reason is an inability to save to pay outright and a reluctance to set up a new direct debit. I can understand this. If your income varies due to zero-hour contracts, and you're living month to month, it can be difficult or impossible to make sure you have enough in your bank to cover your direct debits, and failed direct debits lead to bank charges, which lead to more failed direct debits or being unable to top up your gas meter that week.

The last reason was the same reason I have for not using one, an inability to predict how bad their condition will be that month, and whether a prepaid cert will end up costing more.

The prepaid certs are a good idea. They need advertising more, but I can see how they work well for sufferers of chronic conditions who can afford them and know about them, but if 30% of people with a chronic condition still need to ration medication, it's not working.

And in the midst of a cost-of-living crisis, where there are threads every day from people whose outgoings are suddenly outstripping their income, I'm finding it hard to understand why so many on this thread are unable to conceive of a way where someone might not have a tenner left at the end of the month.

Yes over 90% in England are free

I'm finding it hard to understand why so many on this thread are unable to conceive of a way where someone might not have a tenner left at the end of the month.

I'm finding it hard to understand why someone with asthma puts their health so low down on the list of priorities that they wouldn't set aside a tenner at the start of the month for their prescription charges. If you don't think a prepayment certificate will work out best for you, set aside a tenner when you get paid. If you need an inhaler that month, you've got the money to buy one. If you don't need an inhaler that month, use the tenner for something else or roll it over to the next month. Always make sure you've got a tenner set aside for an inhaler if you need one. It's about learning to budget properly.

If you can't justify the pre-paid route - and when I was in England couldn't pay monthly and it wasn't clear it was cheaper for what I needed - you're back to find the money somehow or do without with associated risks and potentail additional cost to NHS.

This has been an issue for decades now there seem no plans to address it I've heard of - so it is what it is.

It does worry me as two of my DC are also asthmatic and one on additional medication - currently students so fine but they will have to find the money and could end up as stuck as I was in later life - obviously if I know we'll help as my family did but they weren't always aware.

That's fine in theory, but in reality, if you're living pay day to pay day and don't have a tenner left over, you don't have it, whether it's the start of the month or the end of the month. If you put it aside at the start of the month, it's going to be needed for something else by the end of the month.

Are you seriously suggesting if a poster came on saying they had no gas or food and all have they left is £10 they've put aside incase they need medication they'd be advised to lie to their energy provider or food bank and not spend the £10 and hope for the best?

It's all well posting about what people could or should do but if 30% of sufferers are rationing medication then clearly 30% of people either can't or aren't doing what they should do. And those 30% of people are going to end up costing the NHS more in the longrun.

Whatever mental gymnastics you do to try to justify it, the system is not working.

Whatever mental gymnastics you do to try to justify it, the system is not working.

It's you doing the mental gymnastics, coming up with umpteen reasons why an adult can't allocate £10 out of their monthly income for vital medication.

It's you doing the mental gymnastics who can't grasp that not everyone will have a spare £10 left over per month

For the 14th time... it's not about having "a spare £10 left over" each month. It's about allocating £10 at the start of the month which is used for vital medication and nothing else. It should be top priority, before any other spending.

I'm bowing out now as some of the posters on this thread are being deliberately dim and I've better things to do than keep repeating myself.

but I do know forcing 30% of sufferers of chronic illnesses to ration life saving medication is not it

Where are you getting these stats from? Given the young and older population in England have free prescriptions then we are talking about a cohort who are between the ages of 19-59 who are not in receipt of benefits/PIP and who have a chronic health condition.

Given that number of individuals you are claiming that in that cohort 30% ration medication because they can't regularly prioritise £10 per month?. I don't believe your statistics.

I'm someone with chronic health conditions, use a pre payment cert and am very grateful I live in the UK where medication is so affordable for everyone.

So your theory is that all or most of the people rationing their medication, even though it is making them more ill, are doing it because they are too feckless to put the money away and would rather spend it on non-essentials? That amounts to 750,000 people, and all of them would rather buy a takeaway coffee than life-saving medication?

That's highly unlikely to the point of being fantastical. It's feasible that a small number might be prioritising frivolities over their health, but not the majority.

Even if they are doing that, it doesn't negate the fact that making patients pay for the medication needed to manage their chronic illness is costing the NHS more in the longrun.

Ask asthma nurse to prescribe 2 inhalers on each prescription. You can keep them in the fridge.

The only person i knew who did that was a drug addict, who would rather spend a fortune on selfmedicating on illegal drugs that were probably making his condition worse than spend the £10 a month on the certificate for the legal drugs which is effective. He was always complaining he couldnt afford the prescription and had run out

Various sources, but mostly these three;

https://www.prescriptionchargescoalition.org.uk/what-is-the-problem.html

https://www.asthmaandlung.org.uk/sites/default/files/2023-03/auk-prescription-charges-report-final.pdf

https://metro.co.uk/2019/05/07/asthma-prescription-charges-cost-daughter-life-says-grieving-mother-9427965/

There are other charities relating to specific illnesses who've carried out similar surveys with the same results.

If you’re dead because you didn’t buy your inhaler you’re not going to care that your car won’t work or your boiler is broken… that’s people’s point. If the meds are so necessary you could die without them then why are things like cold water and transport put ahead of them?

I don't know anything about other conditions, but with asthma, when it is under control, it's easy to forget that it is under control because of your medication.

It's a condition that's highly variable. You might have very mild asthma and never need your blue inhaler, but that doesn't mean you're immune to a sudden, severe attack that might prove fatal.

If you haven't an attack in months or years, either because your preventative is working or your asthma is mild, I can see how it would be tempting to put off replacing your emergency reliever until payday. Chances are, you'll get away with it, but if you're unlucky, it could cost you your life.

It also seems to be preventatives people are skipping mostly, so they're probably relying on their emergency inhalers and either forgetting or ignoring the chance the reliever might not be enough for a severe attack.

"The average cost of medication is £100 a year but thousands of people are paying in excess of £400 for their inhalers and allergy medication"

From one of those articles ! Nobody had to pay £400 a year. The maximum any has to pay is £114 a year, that article is misleading.

"The number of respondents who reported having to find savings in other areas of their lives because of the need to pay for their asthma medication is an even greater cause for concern, uncovering the real, personal impact that prescription charges are having on many people with asthma: • 35% (2,577/7,465) of respondents said that they had, at times, needed to cut back on food to be able to pay for their asthma medication. • 21% (1,577/7,465) of people said that they had cut back on bills. • 8% (587/7,465) of people said that they had cut back on their children’s school trips and 5% (329/7,465) of respondents on their children’s school uniform to afford their asthma medication. "

Again that survey was just 7500 respondants , there are millions in the uk with something like 60mill asthema pumps issued a year, so a tiny proportion and even those that replied are probably skewing the those figures.

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It's only £114 a year if you have the prepayment card. If you read the study properly a lot of people don't, either because it is not widely publicised, they can't save for it, and are reluctant to set up a new direct debit in case the incur bank charges if they're caught short one month or because their condition is variable and they don't know how much it will cost month to month.