Insulin Price Crisis: The Shocking Role of Government Collusion with Big Pharma

For years now, politicians and bureaucrats have cast Big Pharma as the villain behind skyrocketing insulin prices. They speak of lawsuits and price caps as if they’re defending the public, but the truth is far darker. Behind this manufactured crisis is a government hand, carefully propping up monopolies while pretending to care about the victims. The ones being gouged aren’t just faceless "consumers"—they’re real people, forced into rationing their insulin or risking a black-market buy just to survive. The outrageous price hikes for insulin aren’t just capitalism "gone wrong." They’re the direct consequence of government interference, monopoly, and a regulatory iron grip.

In the last two decades, insulin prices have shot through the roof. Look at Humalog: once $21 a bottle, now it’s over $300. That’s a 1,400% increase for a drug invented over a century ago, designed not to save lives but to enrich bureaucrats and shareholders. People are pushed to spend nearly half their income just to stay alive. Meanwhile, those who can’t afford it have no choice but to ration or buy it on the black market, often from Mexico, where the same drug costs a fraction of what Americans pay.

Monopoly by Design: How the Government Chokes Supply and Inflates Prices

If you know basic economics, you know prices don’t just explode without cause. A rise in demand should drive an increase in supply. But in the case of insulin, the U.S. government has created a fortress around three corporate giants—Eli Lilly, Novo Nordisk, and Sanofi—who control 90% of the global insulin supply. These companies aren’t motivated to compete. Instead, they’re safeguarded by patents, FDA red tape, and licensure requirements that effectively block anyone else from entering the market.

When it comes to insulin, you’re not free to purchase it from just anyone; you have to go through "authorized" pharmacies, backed by "licensed" medical professionals. And those professionals? They’re locked into the same system, forced to play by rules that keep their hands tied while consumers bleed out their paychecks. It’s an orchestrated scheme. And no, it’s not a "free market" but an engineered monopoly—one made possible by the very institutions that claim to "protect" us.

The FDA Roadblock: Stifling Innovation to Preserve Profits

In the U.S., cheaper insulin alternatives exist in name only. "Biosimilars"—cheaper, effective alternatives—are available around the world, including in countries like India, Mexico, and Peru. But thanks to the FDA, Americans couldn’t get their hands on a single approved biosimilar until 2021, despite the fact that cheaper alternatives were already being used abroad for years. Why? Because keeping new competitors out preserves Big Pharma’s cut—and the government’s cut, too.

Meanwhile, the patent system works hand-in-hand with the FDA’s gatekeeping, ensuring that only a select few profit off insulin’s life-or-death necessity. Through relentless patent renewals and extended protections, Big Pharma doesn’t just monopolize insulin; it locks down every ancillary product—from delivery devices to manufacturing processes. This isn’t "innovation." It’s exploitation, subsidized by a taxpayer-funded regulatory apparatus.

The Patent Mirage: How Government-Granted Monopolies Kill Innovation

Critics will tell you that without patents, Big Pharma wouldn’t innovate. But history shows that’s a convenient lie. The real data—suppressed, of course, from mainstream discourse—reveals that in places where patents were limited or absent, pharmaceutical innovation actually thrived. In countries like India, where a strong pre-patent system allowed open competition, companies led the charge in drug manufacturing and drove down costs. And what about insulin itself? Its discovery wasn’t driven by the promise of monopolistic profit but by a simple desire to help those in need. Yet here we are, held hostage to a system where patented "improvements" drive up prices rather than enhance access.

The "Solution" Isn’t a Price Cap—It’s a Free Market

You’ll hear politicians howl for price controls, talking about putting "caps" on insulin to stop price gouging. But if you’ve been paying attention, you know that price caps won’t fix anything. A price cap is a cheap band-aid that ignores the root problem: an artificially limited supply. Cap the price, and companies won’t suddenly play nice; they’ll cut production, reduce availability, and wait until they can cash in later. The only real solution is to dismantle this government-created monopoly system and allow true competition back into the market.

What Americans need isn’t more regulation—it’s less. We need to tear down the licensure requirements, the patent system, the FDA blockades, and every single barrier preventing the market from stabilizing naturally. Until then, every "solution" out of Washington is just another empty promise aimed at maintaining a monopoly.

Your Move

If you’re tired of footing the bill for bureaucratic corruption, you need to start protecting yourself now. Don’t wait until your bank account is drained by a healthcare crisis engineered to fill government coffers and corporate pockets. Take action. Download "Seven Steps to Protect Yourself from Bank Failure" by Bill Brocius here, and get a roadmap for securing your financial freedom before the next engineered crisis lands at your door.