Welcome to the Week in Review.
PBM Showdown In The House
The House Committee on Oversight and Accountability continued its 32-month investigation into pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) with a hearing scrutinizing the middlemen’s shady practices that drive up prescription drug costs. Executives from the three largest PBMs which control 80 percent of the U.S. prescription drug market — OptumRx, ExpressScripts, and CVS Caremark — testified before legislators on the outsized role of PBMs and their anti-competitive tactics which steer patients toward their own pharmacies and prioritize higher-priced medicines. The opaque structure and secretive rebate contracts result in significant profits at the expense of patients in the U.S. who pay three to eight times more for brand-name drugs than residents in comparable nations. Prior to the hearing, the Committee released a staff report, based on over 140,000 pages of internal documents from the companies. They found more than 300 examples of the big three PBMs preferring medications that on average cost at least $500 more per claim than the lower-cost alternative medication they excluded on their formularies. With bipartisan PBM reform bills having cleared key congressional hurdles, the pressure is mounting to rein in these shadowy middlemen and deliver new savings to patients drowning in prescription costs. — (NBC News, The Wall Street Journal, House Oversight Committee, HealthCare Dive)
Drugs Corporations Rake In Profits
While patients struggle with soaring drug prices, the pharmaceutical industry continues to demonstrate robust financial health, as evidenced by the latest quarterly earnings reports. In Q2 of 2024, AstraZeneca reaped nearly $2 billion in profits, while Bristol Myers Squibb earned $1.68 billion, Novartis reported $3.25 billion, and Johnson & Johnson brought in $4.69 billion in profits respectively. All of these corporations have at least one of the drugs they manufacture selected for Medicare negotiation – a program they’re fighting tooth and nail to derail – even though the companies’ executives maintain that the program will have minimal impact on their bottom lines. We expect reports from Merck and Novo Nordisk in the coming weeks — the latter riding high on its wildly popular and overpriced diabetes and weight loss drugs. One thing is crystal clear: Big Pharma’s profit machine shows no signs of slowing and there is urgent need for the ongoing implementation of the drug price reforms in the Inflation Reduction Act to better insulate patients from drug industry greed.
Court Watch: US V. Pharma
Last week, the pharmaceutical industry’s fight to stop Medicare negotiation intensified as special interest groups filed over a dozen amicus briefs in support of lawsuits from AstraZeneca, Bristol Myers Squibb, and Johnson & Johnson. Over the last six years alone these special interest groups — including the Washington Legal Foundation, Manhattan Institute, Biotechnology Innovation Organization (BIO), and Alliance for Aging Research — have received nearly $4.8 million from the industry’s top trade association, the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA), which also filed a suit against the Medicare negotiation program. But while pharma is paying for expensive lawyers, patients are fighting back. Since the lawsuits were filed last year P4AD has signed onto seven amicus briefs led by Public Citizen and supported by AARP, Protect Our Care, Doctors for America, and Families USA, and continue to rally 10s of thousands of patients and allies via a petition urging pharmaceutical CEO’s to drop their lawsuits against the historic Medicare negotiation program. We continue to amplify patient voices in the courtroom to ensure the harm of sky-high drug prices is upfront and center inside and outside the courtroom. — (Accountable.US, FightPharma.org, Public Citizen)
In Case You Missed It
Gilead Sciences is facing backlash over its highly-effective HIV prevention drug, lenacapavir. Patient advocates rallied outside of the 25th International AIDS Conference in Munich this week to demand an end to Gilead’s pricing monopoly. The company’s life-saving HIV drug is priced at $42,250 per year, despite reports that the medicine could be produced for as little as $40 per person each year. Advocates are calling for global action to make this life-saving drug accessible to everyone who needs it.