A week of high drama. Pharma CEOs v. Congress. Jordyn v. Kardashians. Green Book v. Everyone.
Welcome to the week in review in prescription drug pricing!
1. How Pharma lost its edge in Washington
- David Mitchell talks to Bloomberg to discuss the sea change in Washington. — (Bloomberg Businessweek)
2. Big Pharma hurts one in four Americans
- One in four Americans can’t afford their prescription drugs. Just about everyone says that’s unreasonable and that Congress needs to act now. — (Kaiser Family Foundation)
3. Firdapse Flops
- Catalyst Pharmaceuticals priced an old drug for Lambert-Eaton Myasthenic Syndrome at $375,000 a year. Now the FDA is under pressure to make old versions of the drug available for patients. — (STAT)
4. Everybody’s wrong but me
- Tuesday’s Senate Finance Committee hearing centered around the complexity of drug pricing. Pharma executives cited everyone from pharmacy benefit managers to the federal government as the cause of high prices. — (The New York Times)
5. Part B fix picking up steam?
- Big Pharma and its allies are ramping up a campaign to defeat reforms to Medicare Part B. But the Trump administration proposal is gaining allies on Capitol Hill— (The Washington Post)