New York Desk

This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.

The New York Sun
NY Sun
NEW YORK SUN CONTRIBUTOR

STATEWIDE


WEB SITE LISTS STATEWIDE DRUG PRICES


A state Web site has been expanded to include prescription drug prices from all 62 New York counties.


The site, www.NYAGRx.org, first appeared this summer. It was initially based on surveys of prescription drug prices conducted by state Attorney General Eliot Spitzer’s office in 44 counties. Information from the other 18 counties was first posted this weekend.


Aides to Mr. Spitzer said they hope to update the prices on the site once every month. Under state law, pharmacies are supposed to maintain a list of prices, to be given to consumers upon demand, for the 150 most popular prescription drugs. Mr. Spitzer’s Web site features the 25 most commonly prescribed medications, including Prevacid, Celebrex, Flovent, and Zoloft.


As with the earlier price list, Mr. Spitzer’s office reported wide variations in the costs of the drugs from one county to another. For the arthritis reliever Celebrex, for instance, a Wyoming County pharmacy was charging $60.65 for 30 200-milligram pills. The same pills were $131.99 at a Lewis County pharmacy, according to Mr. Spitzer’s Web site.


The price differences continue to be something of a surprise because there is little apparent pattern geographically or among retailers, said a spokesman for the state attorney general’s office.


Joe Baker, chief of Mr. Spitzer’s health care bureau, said the higher prices could be occurring at stores that offer customers additional services, such as free delivery. “Or it may simply be that some drug stores will charge whatever the market will bear and to the extent that they can raise prices and make additional profits, they will do it,” Mr. Baker said.


Some advocates for senior citizens and others dependent on prescription drugs have compared the high cost of medications to price gouging. But Mr. Baker said price gouging is a specific offense where retailers try to capitalize on an emergency by, for instance, charging exorbitant amounts for bottled water when the local water supply system is out of service.


“This (prescription drugs) is a free market and drug stores are free to charge what the market will bear,” Mr. Baker said. The expanded Web site contains price information on 440 pharmacies in the state. The list for any one county is not exhaustive, and Baker said the information should be used as a “starting point” for consumers who are trying to comparison shop locally for the lowest price.


– Associated Press


SURVEY: 36% OF UPSTATE RESIDENTS OVERWEIGHT


More than 36% of upstate New York residents are considered overweight and another 20% are deemed obese, according to a recent survey.


“This is really an upstate New York problem,” said Mary Paris, director of health policy and health services research for Excellus BlueCross BlueShield of Rochester, which sponsored the survey conducted by Zogby International.


“What we hope to do is motivate people to implement changes.”


The survey found that about one in five adults in upstate New York reported they had not engaged in any physical activity outside of work during July.


About 57% of adults reported being physically active for more than six months. Just over 25% of survey respondents said they intended to increase their physical activity level.


The survey also found that 44.5% of upstate New York adults met the Healthy People 2010 objective for “moderate” exercise, defined as exercising 30 or more minutes a day at least five days a week with a small increase in breathing or heart rate. Healthy People 2010 is a nationwide initiative to improve the health of Americans.


– Associated Press


CITYWIDE


RIGHT-TO-VOTE RELAY LAUNCHED FROM MEXICO CITY


Mexican migrants on yesterday launched a two-month relay from Mexico’s capital to New York City, calling on lawmakers here to grant them the right to cast absentee ballots for Mexico’s 2006 presidential elections and organizing undocumented workers along the way.


The binational relay is in its third year, following a 3,800-mile route that travels through northeast Mexico, then the southern and eastern United States, with some 5,000 runners carrying a torch to New York in honor of Mexico’s patron saint, the Virgin of Guadalupe. The relay passes through small farm towns and large cities. The torch is scheduled to arrive at St. Patrick’s Cathedral on December 12, the day Mexicans commemorate the legend that the dark-skinned virgin appeared in 1531 to a poor Indian, Juan Diego, and left her image imprinted on his cloak.


The route is expected to cross the border at Brownsville, Texas, on November 7, then travel across Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, Washington, D.C., Maryland, Delaware, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey. Joel Magallan, executive director of New York’s Tepeyac Association, which organizes the relay, said the event has grown into a march for all migrants’ rights – not just Mexicans living in New York.


“The association’s work is to get those who are invisible to most out into the streets,” he said.


– Associated Press


POLICE BLOTTER


SHOOTINGS LEAVE TWO DEAD, TWO WOUNDED


A Bronx house party ended in a triple-victim shooting early yesterday, and police are searching for a gunman who killed a partygoer and wounded two others.


Police said the gunman confronted the three victims at the lobby of a University Heights apartment building at 2:02 a.m. The victims had been attending a party in an upstairs apartment at the Grand Avenue building prior to the shooting, police said, but the motive for the attack was unknown.


Shots rang out and Robert Roman, 56, of Hoe Avenue, was struck in the chest. Roman was taken to Bronx Lebanon Hospital, where he was pronounced dead. A 27-year-old man was also shot in the chest and a 20-year-old man was shot in the abdomen. Both of these victims were taken to St. Barnabas Hospital, where they were listed in stable condition.


There were no arrests and police are investigating.


In a separate Bronx homicide on Saturday, a teenager was found shot to death at South Bronx. Gregory Chavis, 19, of Third Avenue, was discovered shot in the head in front of a building at East 148th Street at 9:25 p.m. Chavis was pronounced dead at the scene. There were no arrests and police are investigating.


– Staff Reporter of the Sun


THREE SHOT, THREE GUNMEN AT LARGE


Three victims were shot, one fatally, in scattered incidents in Brooklyn over a 24-hour period, and the gunmen remain at large in all three shootings.


In the first shooting, at 8:05 p.m. on Saturday, a 20-year-old man identified by police as Lionel Hudson was shot in the chest and back. Mr. Hudson was standing in front of a building on West 26th Street when he was gunned down, police said. Mr. Hudson was taken to Lutheran Hospital, where he was listed in stable condition.


The second shooting occurred 30 minutes after midnight yesterday morning, when a 25-year-old man was discovered shot in the head in front of his Bedford-Stuyvesant home. Luis Ortega of Myrtle Avenue was found with two gunshot wounds to the back of his head. Ortega was taken to Woodhull Hospital, where he was pronounced dead an hour after he was found.


In a third, unrelated shooting last night in Bushwick, an unidentified man was walking down Linden Avenue at 8 p.m. when he felt pain in his leg. He was taken to Elmhurst Hospital, where he was treated for a gunshot wound to the leg.


– Staff Reporter of the Sun

NY Sun
NEW YORK SUN CONTRIBUTOR

This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.


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