Two important people wrote Medium posts this week. You maybe missed this one.
Welcome to the Week in Review in Prescription Drug Pricing.
1. News from our founder
Patients For Affordable Drugs Founder David Mitchell shared tough news this week — his cancer has relapsed. Even on his worst days, he is buoyed by the bravery of our community of patients. — (Medium)
2. Exploitation over Innovation
A young man relying on a drug to walk saw his costs rise from $0 to $375k — and all a drug corporation did was grab the patent, add a preservative, and give the product a new name. — (NBC Nightly News)
3. J&J caves to transparency pressure
Johnson & Johnson will begin to advertise on television the cost of one of its medications, giving in to pressure from the Trump administration to list drug prices in TV ads. We maintain advertising tax credits should be abolished, or the ads should end all together. — (AP)
4. CREATES is BACK
Congress needs to pass the bipartisan bill that would increase drug competition and save taxpayers more than $3 billion — (Center for Biosimilars)
5. CEOs to testify
After a dressing down by Senate Finance Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), five Big Pharma CEOs agree to testify at the committee’s drug pricing hearings later this month. — (STAT)
Ready your chicken wings, chili bowls, and Tony Romo prediction bets.
But first, it’s the week in review in prescription drug pricing!
1. Storms are a-brewing
What’s colder? This wind chill or Pharma’s ice-cold refusal to testify before the Senate Finance Committee? — (The Hill)
2. Middlemen called out
The Trump administration took a step in the right direction by increasing transparency and ending rebates to drug middlemen in government programs. The hope is savings would reach patients instead. — (The Washington Post)
3. Touchdown!!! ??
The Super Bowl may be the most-watched event this week, but we’re also excited about a Congressional kickoff — a probe into insulin costs — (FiercePharma)
4. Strong armed no more?
There’s been a surprise twist in a three-year drug pricing standoff between the UK and Vertex — the maker of groundbreaking-but-pricey cystic fibrosis therapies. A British politician is pushing parliament to issue a license that would allow a generic drug maker to make copies of a Vertex medicine. — (STAT)
5. California Love
The governor of the country’s most populous state signed an executive order directing the state’s massive Medicaid program to negotiate prescription drug prices for 13 million recipients. — (Reuters)
It’s drug pricing palooza!
Welcome to the week in review in prescription drug pricing.
1. LOL Pfizer
Pfizer spun its January price hikes as impacting an itsy bitsy portion of its drugs. Too bad the 41 drugs it hiked represent half the pharma giant’s revenue. — (Axios)
The Republican-controlled Senate and Democratic-controlled House are kicking off 2019 by lighting up out-of-control drug pricing with Senate Finance and House Oversight committee hearings Tuesday.— (The Hill)
4. It’s a thing. A 2020 thing. Potential presidential candidates are staking claims in the drug pricing debate. Smart move,
since 80 percent of the public wants our elected leaders to lower drug prices. — (KHN)
5. Highly Illogical
The drug lobby’s arguments against holding down prices in Medicare Part B just don’t add up. — (STAT)
Welcome to the Week in Review in Prescription Drug Pricing!
1. Laboratories for lower drug prices
States aren’t waiting around for the federal government to act on drug prices. Maryland wants a board to hold Big Pharma accountable. — (The Baltimore Sun)
2. Close the Big Pharma Tax Loophole
Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) introduced legislation to prohibit pharmaceutical corporations from claiming tax deductions for direct-to-consumer advertising expenses. Big Pharma spent $6 billion on direct-to-consumer ads in 2016 alone. — (STAT News)
3. Azar on the move
HHS chief Alex Azar is on the move on Capitol Hill, stumping for lower drug prices, especially in Medicare Part B. — (The Washington Post)
4. Pfizer Pflops
Pfizer hiked the prices on 41 prescription drugs this week, in blatant disregard for the financial health and wellbeing of all Americans. It’s not OK. — (P4AD)
5. ✈️✈️✈️
Are the executives at Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson, and Novartis doing a lot of “innovating” on their private airplanes? — (Twitter)
WASHINGTON D.C. — Patients For Affordable Drugs Now launched a nearly $1 million campaign in support of the Department of Health and Human Services’ proposal to lower drug prices in Medicare Part B. Under the proposal, Medicare would pay only 26 percent more than other wealthy countries for drugs administered by physicians or in hospital settings — that’s compared to the 80 percent more it pays today. But Big Pharma is attacking the proposal because the changes could actually rein in outrageous drug prices. Patients For Affordable Drugs Now’s campaign will include digital advertisements, patient fly-ins, polling, and videos featuring patients who stand to access more affordable drugs under the proposal.
“American patients pay far more than people in other countries for prescription drugs, and it’s just plain wrong,” said David Mitchell, a cancer patient and the founder of Patients For Affordable Drugs Now. “Out-of-control drug prices force hard working Americans to choose between groceries and their medications. HHS has a promising plan to use an International Pricing Index to bring U.S. drug prices more in line with drug prices in other wealthy countries. We’re standing up in support of this change because America’s prescription drug pricing system is broken, and patients need change now.”
The nationwide ads on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Google will urge Americans to contact their senators and representatives in support of the HHS Part B demonstration (examples below).
According to a recent poll, voters support the HHS proposal to lower drug prices by a 71-point margin (80 percent support vs. 9 percent oppose). Majorities from both parties agree that Democrats and Republicans in Congress should support the proposal.
Importantly, Americans find Big Pharma’s claim that the proposed reforms would hinder patient access to be wrong. Eight in 10 voters believe the proposal will result in better careor have no impact on the care they receive. That’s bolstered by the fact that nine out of 10 big pharmaceutical companies actually spend more on advertising and marketing than on research and development, according to the Washington Post. There is no evidence the proposed Part B changes would impact patient access to drugs unless drug corporations withhold drugs from patients.
Patients For Affordable Drugs Now recently released a petition signed by more than 1,500 patient advocates urging the administration to move forward with the proposal to lower drug prices in Medicare Part B. The letter was accompanied by a video featuring Ruth Rinehart, a patient with primary immune deficiency from Florida, and Mike Gaffney, a resident of Washington State who lives with a rare form of multiple myeloma called POEMS syndrome. In the video, the patients speak directly about what the Part B changes would mean for them.
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WASHINGTON, DC –– By a 71-point margin, voters support the Department of Health and Human Services’ proposal to lower drug prices in Medicare Part B by implementing an International Pricing Index (80 percent support vs. 9 percent oppose). Majorities from both parties believe Democrats and Republicans in Congress should support the proposal that would lower prices for infused drugs administered in physician offices and hospitals.Importantly, 8 in 10 voters believe the proposal will result in better care or have no impact on the care they receive. Click here to read the poll.
Support for the proposed Medicare Part B reforms are widely popular.
Among Democrats, 69 percent of voters say “even though I don’t normally agree with President Trump, his efforts to lower prescription drug costs for Medicare Part B should be supported by the Democratic majority in Congress.”
Among Republicans, 83 percent of voters say “the Republican Majority in the Senate should support President Trump’s proposed changes to Medicare Part B.”
81 percent of voters think the Medicare Part B proposed changes would result in patients receiving better care (45 percent) or it would have no impact on the care that patients receive (36 percent).
Voters say drug prices are too high and both Congress and the President should do more to lower them.
85 percent of voters say lowering drug prices should be “a top” or “an important” priority for Congress.
Only 9 percent of voters believe Big Pharma’s argument that drug prices are high because “it cost billions of dollars to develop new prescription drugs.” Instead they say that drug companies “jack up prices higher than they need to in order to have more profits” (50 percent) or because “drug companies spend millions of dollars contributing to the campaigns of members of Congress, who then do nothing to bring down the price of drugs” (21 percent).
83 percent of voters believe that people in other countries “pay far less for prescription drugs than we pay in the United States.”
“Voters in this country are clamoring for reforms to lower drug prices and they want officials in Washington to take action to bring prices more in line with other wealthy nations,” said David Mitchell, a Medicare beneficiary, cancer patient, and the Founder of Patients For Affordable Drugs NOW. “This proposal will lower list prices and out-of-pocket costs for patients.”
75 percent of voters support—and 50 percent strongly support—the element of the proposal that will change the way doctors are paid to administer the drugs from a percentage to a fixed fee, thereby eliminating the incentive to prescribe more expensive drugs.
The telephone survey of 1,000 likely voters was conducted by GS Strategy Group from December 11-13, 2018. 50 percent of the interviews were completed via cell phone. It has a margin of error of +/- 3.2 percent at the 95 percent confidence level.
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‘Tis the season — for drug corporations to spend tax windfalls buying back billions in stock while refusing to lower drug prices.
Welcome to the Week in Review in Prescription Drug Pricing!
1. AstroTurf: Activate!
Big Pharma is whipping its hundreds of pharma front groups into a fury to try to stop a good idea from *even becoming a federal proposal.* Why? Because the Medicare Part B International Pricing Index demo project would actually lower drug prices. — (AJMC)
2. CEO carolers: “All I want for Christmas are my company’s own shares”
Big Pharma CEOs could use their massive tax windfalls to lower drug prices. They are buying back billions of dollars in shares instead to enrich themselves at the expense of patients. — (Axios)
3. Now streaming
You need a weekend drug pricing documentary in your life. So watch the new film, “DRUG$: The Price We Pay.” — (KALW & L.A. Times)
4. In honor of Alec Smith
Minneapolis resident Alec Smith died in 2017 after rationing insulin he could not afford. Lawmakers in Minnesota, where nearly a half million people live with diabetes, are ready to fight for a bill that would push back on insulin price gouging. Legislation named for Alec failed to pass last session. — (Star Tribune)
5. THAWED: That laughable Pfizer price hike freeze
Sen. Tammy Baldwin, D.-Wis, demanded transparency from Pfizer and accused the pharma giant of playing political games in her latest letter to CEO Ian Read. The drug corporation is expected to raise prices on 41 drugs in January following empty promises of a price hike freeze. — (FiercePharma)
1. More $$$ for Big Pharma? Thank u, next.
Drug companies are asking Congress to reduce their contributions to the Medicare Part D program. A new study finds that under the PhRMA proposal, beneficiaries could spend an additional $1.3 billion and patients would see increased premiums and higher out-of-pocket costs. — (PEW)
2. Straight to the naughty list.
The drug maker Actelion Pharmaceuticals agreed to pay a $360 million settlement stemming from an investigation into illegally funneled kickbacks through a patient-assistance charity. — (NYTimes)
3. You get a patent! You get a patent! Everyone gets a patent!
Drug giant Amgen has filed a grand total of 57 patents for its arthritis drug Enbrel, extending the drug’s market exclusivity through 2029. — (Axios)
4. Lower prices or stock buybacks?
Multiple members of Congress criticize drug manufacturers for using savings from the tax overhaul to buy back shares rather than lowering prices for patients. — (WSJ)
5. What do a Democratic senator and a Republican senator have in common? Drug pricing reform.
Senator Chuck Grassley and Senator Ron Wyden introduce a bipartisan drug pricing bill tackling manufacturers using tactics to overcharge taxpayers for Medicaid rebates. — (The Hill)
