The cost of blood glucose measurement strips is a complex interaction
of R&D costs, manufacturing costs, marketing strategy, insurance
practices, and undoubtedly other factors. You can ask on the net if you
want; you'll get lots of comments but no answers.

There are a few of ways of reducing the cost of blood glucose
monitoring.

One is to seek out the best price for the strips; large stores such as
Costco often have good prices, as do some online order suppliers.

A second way is to choose a meter with lower cost strips. Your health
care team may be familiar with and prefer a particular meter, but it's
not likely that they considered cost in making their choice. If you
insist that you need a lower cost system, they should be willing to
work with you. All meters now on the market are adequately accurate for
home use, so if you are getting strips under insurance, you are
generally safe in using the preferred brand under your plan.

At one time, you could use visually read strips (such as Chemstrip bG)
and cut them in half. This type of strip has mostly disappeared from the
market as of 2007 and the prices on any remaining is high, so this is no
longer a viable option.

Most discussion on m.h.d of the cost of blood glucose measurement strips
has centered on the US. I'm not sure why, though a good guess is that
differences in health care systems and national policies make this
issue more critical to the individual patient in the US. There is no
dearth of non-US participants on m.h.d.