I was on the phone on hold when I heard a woman’s indignant voice at our pharmacy’s pick up counter.
“$60? Why, that’s ridiculous! There must be some mistake. It’s supposed to be $25.00.”
Uh, oh. Another patient here to pick up her prescription for Allegra. Time for me to explain why her copay jumped from $25.00 to $60.00. I finished my phone call and walked over to rescue the cashier.
I smiled at our frustrated customer. “No, I’m sorry, but your prescription insurance is no longer covering Allegra. It’s because it is no longer a prescription only medicine. Its patent has expired, and it is now available without a prescription.”“But…can’t you just have it switched to a generic buy levitra online canada buy viagra uk?”
“We could do that. But that won’t help your copay, because your insurance plan is no longer covering that drug AT ALL. And for some reason, there IS no prescription generic available for us to order right now.”
“But if it went generic, it should be cheaper, not MORE expensive!”
“Well, it will eventually be less expensive, when it is available as a generic. But you can still get your Allegra, it just doesn’t NEED a prescription any more.”
I stepped out in front of the pharmacy counter and walked her over to the 2 strengths of Allegra now packaged and sold with the allergy products.
The good news is, you can now buy Allegra at the full prescription strengths, 60mg and 180mg, without a prescription at your pharmacy or grocery.
The bad news is, if you were one of the people who had insurance that paid for most of the cost of prescription Allegra, it is now cheaper for you to buy it yourself than to pay the entire cost of the prescription version.
There are 2 strengths available: Allegra 60mg 12 Hour and Allegra 180mg 24 Hour.
Allegra is a newer type of antihistamine that helps relieve allergic symptoms like itchy and runny nose, watery eyes, and stuffy nose without causing much drowsiness or sedation.
Right now, Allegra is more expensive than similar non-sedating antihistamines such as Loratadine (Claritin) and cetirazine (Zyrtec), because they have generic versions available. But if you are looking for another option for allergy relief without drowsiness, Allegra is now available over the counter (without a prescription).
Allegra 180mg 24 Hour once a day is equivalent to loratadine 10mg or cetirazine 10mg once a day.
