Here’s a letter to the Boston Globe:
Jeff Jacoby rightly condemns Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey’s ominous “fact-finding mission” into the rise of the price of the wonder drug Naloxone, which is used to treat heroin overdoses (“Politicians, ‘profiteers,’ and public health,” April 26). As Mr. Jacoby points out, there’s nothing at all mysterious or nefarious about the price of a product rising when demand for that product rises. Prices are supposed to rise as demand rises.
Therefore, given the recent surge in heroin use – and, hence, the resulting increase in demand for Naloxone – Ms. Healey’s investigation into the causes of the current rise in Massachusetts of the price of Naxolone is as scientifically justified as would be, given the recent rise in the sun’s arc in the northern hemisphere, an investigation into the causes of the current rise in Massachusetts of the average daily temperature.
Sincerely,
Donald J. Boudreaux
Professor of Economics
and
Martha and Nelson Getchell Chair for the Study of Free Market Capitalism at the Mercatus Center
George Mason University
Fairfax, VA 22030
