The Wellness Company is deeply unethical and rips off its customers
In pitching its products, the company engages in viral fearmongering. It does no favors to anyone aligned with a mission that seeks a more rational discourse.
Readers of The Dossier may have encountered The Wellness Company (TWC), an “emergency medicine kit” distributor founded by Dr. Peter McCullough, and it’s now sponsoring a plethora of major influencers on social media.
I’ve encountered several big names in the “anti-establishment” space doing promos of the company’s “Medical Emergency Kits,” so I thought I’d check it out to see what all of the fuss is about.
TWC sells a variety of “emergency kits” ranging from $299 to $399, promising to deliver a “medicine cabinet” full of “life-saving medications” for “ultimate readiness.” Their sponsored content frequently appears on popular right of center media channels, marketing their content in a similar fashion to “doom bunker” ads.
But in pitching its products, the company routinely engages in insane fearmongering. It does no favors to anyone aligned with a mission that seeks a more rational discourse. One such sponsored post that was featured on Breitbart earlier this week read:
“It’s Here: FDA Warns 25% Kill Rate in New Virus. The Wellness Company and their new prescription Contagion Kits are the gold standard when it comes to keeping you safe and healthy.”
There are few things more loathsome than to scare people without insurance into buying medications that they may not need, or worse, end up using unnecessarily.
These ads are deeply unethical and in part motivated this investigation. The Bird Flu strain that is in the news has been around for decades. And it’s hard to get lower than deliberately inciting panic with the goal of making people waste their money on “contagion kits.”
There’s also a very high level of unaccountability that comes from sending otherwise healthy people a series of eight different prescription medications, with the obvious potential outcome that they will take to self-diagnosing in the event of a future ailment.
Now it’s time to run the numbers.
For a grand total of $299 (a little less if you find a promo code), TWC schedules a “virtual consultation” and then sends you their “Emergency Medicine Kit” that comes with an “assortment of life-saving medications for ultimate readiness.” Shipping is included for U.S. customers
Let’s start with the price.
Is $299 a good deal?
We used GoodRx, an app that displays prices of prescription products that can be used with or without insurance, to determine the value of the TWC kit.
The medicines included in the kit are Amoxicillin, Azithromycin (generic Z-Pak™), Doxycycline, Metronidazole, generic Bactrim, Ivermectin, Fluconazole, and Ondansetron.
So that’s 5 antibiotics, one antiparasitic drug, one anti-fungal, and one anti-nausea medication.
Via GoodRx, here are the current prices for these pills:
Amoxicillin: $3.10 at Walgreens, $8.99 at CVS
Z-Pak: $10.50 at both Walgreens and CVS
Doxycycline: $10.28 at Walgreens, $15.16 at CVS
Metronidazole: $3.62 at Walgreens, $11.21 at CVS
Bactrim: $3.67 at Walgreens, $10.97 at CVS
Ivermectin: $18.40 at Walgreens and CVS
Fluconazole: $3.92 at Walgreens, $12.43 at CVS
Ondansetron: $22 at Walgreens, $33 at CVS
Total price without insurance at CVS: $120.66
Total price without insurance at Walgreens: $75.49
Now let’s add the cost of Telehealth services for uninsured Americans. Here are some popular Telehealth providers and the costs included in their services:
GoodRx Care: $30 and under per visit without insurance
MDLive: $40 to $50 per visit without insurance
Teladoc: $0 to $75 per visit without insurance
Amwell: $79 per visit without insurance
Doctor on Demand: $75 per visit without insurance
Mira: $25 per visit (no insurance necessary)
Averaging this out, a reasonably priced Telehealth visit without insurance should cost around $50.
Total cost for uninsured via CVS on 5/23/24: $175.66
Total cost for uninsured via Walgreens on 5/23/24: $125.49
For the cost of convenience, The Wellness Company is effectively charging customers without insurance around twice the cost of medicines that are readily available in virtually every major pharmacy in America. For insured Americans, the cost of the Wellness kit is multiple times over what the visit plus prescriptions would cost at your local pharmacy.
Not only is The Wellness company a deeply unethical enterprise, they also rip you off for cheap generic medications that are easily accessible (minus ivermectin if you specifically want it for Covid) at virtually any pharmacy in America.
If their mission was noble, perhaps the extra costs would be worth it to support their entry into a space dominated by nefarious corporations that advance the interests of Big Pharma. But unfortunately, The Wellness Company is an unethical business that does not deserve anyone’s money.
thanks for the breakdown.
I've followed McCullough and others tied to the Company before they started hawking the products, and while I agree with them on a lot and think they helped expose a lot, this is certainly a shame to see!
Great reporting Jordan, this is exactly why I am a subscriber, going after the truth no matter who or what. I would hope that Dr. McCullough will see this and take the necessary steps to correct this immoral marketing. Keep up the great work.