WASHINGTON — A new Medicare Web site comparing prescription drug prices is full of inaccurate, erroneous information, drug card sponsors said on Friday, just hours after the site was unveiled by the Bush administration.
Tommy G. Thompson, the secretary of health and human services, had said the Web site would allow Medicare beneficiaries to penetrate the mysteries of drug pricing.
But companies offering the cards said the government and its contractor had posted inaccurate data.
"In some cases, the numbers may be too low, but in many cases, the numbers are too high," said Craig L. Fuller, president of the National Association of Chain Drug Stores, which has joined Express Scripts in offering a drug discount card to Medicare beneficiaries.
Stephen E. Littlejohn, vice president of Express Scripts, said: "Our price for a 30-day supply of Vioxx, an arthritis drug, is listed as $159.32 when it should have been listed as $85.93. Celebrex was listed as $121.55. It should have been $84.78. Premarin was listed as $47.43. It should have been $30.71."
Other card sponsors voiced similar complaints. The inaccuracies add to the confusion surrounding the discount cards and the new Medicare law.
Rep. Bill Thomas, R-Calif., chief architect of the law, said Friday that its success was imperiled by a steady drumbeat of Democratic criticism likely to discourage elderly people from signing up for discount cards and drug benefits.
"Democrats hope this law will fail," said Thomas, the chairman of the Ways and Means Committee. Democrats, he said, should allow the law to work "before they gleefully announce it's a failure."
Drug card sponsors are eager for the law to work well, but they were annoyed to see inaccurate data posted on the official Medicare Web site.
Medicare beneficiaries can sign up for cards starting Monday and can use the cards from June of this year until January 2006, when Medicare's new drug benefit begins.
Dr. Mark B. McClellan, administrator of the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, rejected criticism of data on the agency's Web site.
"We stand by our prices," McClellan said. "I do believe the prices are accurate."