At a January 2020 hearing for State Sen. Karen Keiser’s first insulin cost-sharing bill, physicians and patients testified to the high cost of the drug that keeps them alive.
Kevin Wren of patient advocacy group Insulin 4 All described the impossible choices people with diabetes are forced to make when they can’t afford insulin, including limiting their intake of the drug, a practice known as “insulin rationing.”
“Having lost my job in 2013, I was on COBRA insurance and couldn’t afford insulin and was forced to ration,” said Wren. “I had to borrow insulin from my father, and without that relationship, I might have died. I know people that have died. I know thousands that have rationed … these stories are not unique. They’re commonplace.”