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A startup is working to help Americans navigate ongoing shortages of highly-coveted drugs like Adderall and Ozempic. Their solution is to outsource the detective work of finding which pharmacies have these medicines in stock to freelancers abroad.
Insito Health’s medicine finding service Medfinder was launched in January by co-founders Peter Daggett and Parth Shah, both of whom have ADHD. They told 404 Media that they came up with the idea after joking that they would be willing to pay someone $100 to help them find where to they could fill an Adderall prescription. Since then, they have helped thousands of people locate hard-to-find medications.
In 2024, the number of ongoing drug shortages has reached a record high of 323, according to the American Society of Health-System Pharmacists (ASHP).
According to Daggett and Shah, the majority of their customers are trying to find Adderall and similar stimulants, which first went into shortage in 2022.
Customers are also looking for popular diabetes and weight loss drugs known as GLP-1s that include Mounjaro, Zepbound, Wegovy, and Ozempic.
Insito Medfinder hires people abroad in countries like the Philippines through the freelancing platform Upwork to call pharmacies in the United States on behalf of patients to see if they have medications that are in limited supply in stock, according to 404 Media. The workers are trained by Insito to make sure they follow HIPAA rules.
Customers pay Insisto Medfinder $50 to find one medication, $120 for help finding three medications, and $180 for locating six medications. Those charges are per refill.
Other companies are also stepping up to help patients through historic drug shortages.
In May, telehealth platform Ro launched its GLP-1 Supply Tracker allowing patients to sign up to receive alerts when a GLP-1 drug is back in supply in their area, including contact information for pharmacies where the medication is available.
Eli Lilly, the maker of Zepbound and Mounjaro, is developing a similar tool. The company’s diabetes and obesity division president Patrik Jonsson told Quartz that it is working to update is supply website with a heat map showing where patients can find their dose of Mounjaro and Zepbound.