What percentage of Americans purchase prescription drugs from mail-order pharmacies?

Among Americans who bought prescription drugs in 2005, about 13 percent purchased them from mail-order pharmacies, up slightly from the approximately 9 percent who purchased prescription drugs from mail-order pharmacies in 2000, according to the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.

About 37 percent of the Americans who bought drugs from mail-order pharmacies in 2005 were age 65 and older, about 88 percent were white and about 87 percent had private health insurance. Also, roughly 75 percent of the Americans who purchased drugs from mail-order pharmacies in 2005 had at least one chronic illness.

Between 2000 and 2005, the number of Americans who purchased prescription medicines from drug stores dropped from 65 percent to 61 percent; the number of Americans who purchased prescription drugs from pharmacies located in clinics, HMOs or hospitals dropped from 15 percent to 13 percent; and the number of Americans who bought prescription drugs from pharmacies located in supermarkets and super stores fell from 32 percent to 28 percent between 2000 and 2005.

The statistics, which come from AHRQ’s News and Numbers, are taken from the Medical Expenditure Panel Survey. For more information, visit www.meps.ahrq.gov/mepsweb/data_files/publications/st200/stat200.pdf.