Getting an earful of a shocking price difference

READERS' FORUM:Have your say

A reader from Navan contacted us after coming across a striking North/South pricing anomaly for a drug he needed to deal with an ear complaint. “Having suffered from a painful ear since last December, I visited the Eye and Ear Hospital in Dublin on the advice of my doctor.” He was diagnosed with an ear infection and a torn inner ear drum and was prescribed a particular type of medicine.

“I went to O’Reilly’s Pharmacy on Leeson St to buy the medication and paid €32 for 20ml.” He just bought a month’s supply although the drug is only available in a small number of chemists – he figured he’d be back in Dublin within the month to get a fresh supply.

“On a recent trip to Enniskillen, for the hell of it, I checked a pharmacy to see if they had the product in stock. They did and a 20ml tube cost €4.60, that is euro not pounds. I had spent more than seven times that for the exact same product in Dublin. Yet another example of Rip-Off Republic and especially worrying for elderly people.” We contacted the pharmacy in question and were given an explanation for the wild price discrepancy. Apparently the ear medication is an unlicensed medicine in this country and has to be imported from the UK by the pharmacy.

The reason it is unlicensed is not because it is deemed to be in any way dangerous but because the manufacturer has not deemed it worth their while to shell out the thousands of euro required to get the licence for this jurisdiction. It can, however, still be prescribed by doctors here. We were told that in addition to a higher wholesale price there was also a dispensing fee and a pharmacist’s mark-up to take into account – all of which led to the higher price, we were told.

Take a bow, Aer Lingus

Margaret Williams from Co Kildare has asked if she can use this page to say a thank you to Aer Lingus “for a change”. As a result of volcanic ash her two flights were cancelled so she requested a refund on one of the flights.

“Four days following my fax I got a courtesy call from Aer Lingus on my mobile informing me they were refunding my credit card ‘within a week’ which they duly did.”

She then re-booked the other flight to Malaga for two weeks later and she got there without any problems but was stranded in Malaga – again due to volcanic ash. “I re-booked from Malaga with absolutely no problem and arrived home only two days late. I faxed Aer Lingus with expenses incurred for the extra two days and only five days on I received a confirmation letter in the mail from Aer Lingus explaining their backlog and saying they will refund me expenses as quickly as they can.”

She says that she seems to hear only complaints about Aer Lingus but has been “using their service only once or twice a year and I truly have never had a reason to complain. Please print a positive letter in your paper.” Done.

GIY fights back

Still more on growing your own food. Last week a reader called Anne Cullen exhorted people to get out and grow but expressed concern at the high costs that were being attached to growing, particular when it comes to raised beds and gardening courses. Michael Kelly (pictured) of GIY Ireland got in touch to say his organisation “doesn’t have an official view on whether people should grow in raised beds or sow direct in their own soil”. He says, in fact, it does not have “an official view on any aspect of home-growing, except for one: we think everyone should grow their own food.”

He points out that the job of GIY Ireland “is to bring amateur growers together so they can share tips, opinions, knowledge and expertise among themselves. As one might expect given the size of the organisation (over 70 GIY groups around Ireland and approximately 5,000 GIYers involved between our community groups and our online website, giyireland.com), there is a “diverse range of opinions about the best/cheapest/quickest/easiest methods of growing”. He says such views “are personal to individual GIYers, and not an ‘official’ line. We have also never told people to attend costly courses,” as our reader says. “In fact our mission is to give people free of charge access to the information they need to grow their own successfully – meetings and membership of GIY Ireland are free and the organisation is a registered charity.”