Patients are speaking up about how Bob Hugin’s decision to double the price of a lifesaving cancer drug resulted in debt, bankruptcy, and financial pain for middle class families. Patients from New Jersey and across America are warning Garden State voters that Big Pharma CEO Bob Hugin made more than $100 million by raising drug prices so high that cancer patients were forced into debt just to stay alive. Patients For Affordable Drugs NOW is publishing the stories as part of an effort to lift up the patient voice ahead of New Jersey’s U.S. Senate race and shine a light on Bob Hugin’s unscrupulous record.
“Bob Hugin’s unethical behavior to block less expensive generics and double the price of cancer medications patients need to stay alive has real-world consequences best expressed by those who have been hurt,” said David Mitchell, a cancer patient who took Hugin’s drug and president of Patients For Affordable Drugs NOW. “While he walked away with $140 million, people like Gulay Turan had to sell her furniture to afford the drug she needed to extend her mother’s life. Hugin cannot be a U.S. Senator.”
Read what patients have to say about their struggles to afford the prescription drugs Hugin price gouged.
For interviews with patients featured on the blog, contact Communications Director Juliana Keeping.
By Gulay Turan
East Rutherford, NJ
Gulay Turan maxed out credit cards and sold her furniture in order to afford her 66-year-old mother’s blood cancer medication, Revlimid. “I learned he increased the cost of my mother’s medicine by 100 percent in a decade, and I want him to know this action has consequences. The consequence is my mother is getting sicker, faster…If I could speak to the man responsible for the cost of my mother’s cancer medication, I would tell him about the heartbreak and crushing stress I feel.”
By Nancy Cartwright
Las Vegas, NV
To pay for the cancer drugs that kept her husband alive, Nancy Cartwright emptied her 401k, burned through her family’s savings account, and sold her family home. It wasn’t enough. Nancy and her husband eventually filed for bankruptcy. One of the drugs that forced the Cartwrights into financial ruin was the Celgene drug Thalomid.
“Besides bearing witness to my husband’s physical pain, I also witnessed the immense mental toll the cost of his medication took on him. It’s so hard to watch someone suffer and not be able to do anything to help. My hair even began to thin from stressing over his medication costs,” Cartwright said.
“I am facing as much as $19,167 a year just to stay alive”
By Jackie Trapp
Muskego, WI
Jackie Trapp, 53, who has multiple myeloma, must pay for Revlimid or a similar drug for the rest of her life. She worries she will bankrupt her husband of 30 years due to her medication costs. “With my current insurance, I am facing as much as $19,167 per year just to stay alive,” she said, adding “There is no justification for Celgene’s price hikes under Bob Hugin and no justification for lack of transparency into his former corporation’s price hikes. Bob Hugin is a dangerous choice for senator.
Paid for by Patients For Affordable Drugs NOW, www.fightpharma.org. Not authorized by any candidate or candidate’s committee.
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WASHINGTON, D.C. — Patients in Maine are celebrating the passage of a new law that would help Mainers understand why prescription drugs prices keep rising. Patients For Affordable Drugs NOW, a patient advocacy organization, applauded passage of the bill.
“My 5-year-old son, Dakota, needs insulin to live,” said Sabrina Burbeck, a single mom who lives in Old Town. “When drug corporations charge $200-a-vial for a drug invented in the 1920s, we should all worry and demand change. There is no justifiable reason that his insulin costs keep going up, and the fear of my son losing his life-saving medicine keeps me up at night.”
A bipartisan group of Maine state legislators passed LD 1406 in April. The legislation, which became law yesterday, allows the Maine Health Data Organization to gather information from drug corporations about their pricing practices and to report its findings to citizens in Maine.
Patients For Affordable Drugs Now is a bipartisan advocacy organization focused exclusively on policies to lower drug prices. To maintain its independence, P4ADNow does not accept funding from organizations that profit from the development or distribution of prescription drugs.
For Maine patient interviews, contact Juliana Keeping.
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WASHINGTON, D.C. — Big Pharma is lobbying Congress to repeal a rule that requires drug corporations to pay a higher share of prescription costs for people on Medicare. At the same time, patient advocates descended on Washington, D.C., to tell lawmakers not cave to pharma lobbying without supporting the CREATES Act, a bill to lower drug prices.
“If Congress caves to pharma and repeals drug cost protections for Medicare beneficiaries in the donut hole, the least they can do is stop stalling and pass the bipartisan CREATES Act,” said David Mitchell, a cancer patient and the founder of Patients For Affordable Drugs Now.
According to news reports, lobbyists and lawmakers “are working to relax a law that would force drug makers to pay a higher percentage of costs for Medicare beneficiaries.”
The CREATES Act (S. 974 and H.R. 2212) would stop big drug companies from blocking competition by refusing to allow their brand name drugs to be used in testing needed to get approval for generic competitors. If passed, patients would get access to lower-priced generic drugs faster.
Among the patients visiting lawmakers are:
The pharmaceutical lobby spent $25 million last year and continues to oppose the CREATES Act despite calls from FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb, FreedomWorks, and the Heritage Foundation to pass the bill.
A new national poll shows that Americans across the political spectrum want Congress to make lower drug prices a top priority, and voters support passage of the CREATES Act by an 83 to 9 margin. According to a survey from the Republican-led research firm GS Strategies, 85 percent of voters nationwide say lowering the cost of prescription drugs should be a leading priority for Congress compared to just 12 percent who consider it a low priority.
Patients For Affordable Drugs Now aims to act as a counterbalance to drug corporation influence and conducts on-the-ground advocacy in support of candidates and policies to curb drug prices. It does not accept funding from any organizations that profit from the development or distribution of prescription drugs.
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ANNAPOLIS, Md. — Maryland is taking a strong stand on drug prices today with the introduction of SB1023, legislation to establish a drug cost commission and ensure Maryland residents pay fair prices for prescriptions. The legislation is strongly endorsed by Patients For Affordable Drugs NOW, a bipartisan national patient organization focused on policies to lower drug prices. Patients For Affordable Drugs NOW announced plans to educate, activate, and mobilize Maryland patients in support of the bill.
“The Maryland residents we hear from are tired of drug corporations raising prices without regard to the harm to patients and consumers,” said David Mitchell, a cancer patient and Maryland resident whose drugs cost $450,000 per year and the Founder of Patients For Affordable Drugs NOW. “The legislation introduced today would be a serious step forward toward helping millions of Marylanders by keeping drugs affordable. I urge the legislature to move quickly and enact this critical measure.”
P4ADNOW has collected hundreds of stories from the Appalachians to the Chesapeake Bay. The organization will create online tools that help patients contact elected officials in support of the bill, and it will amplify the voices of Maryland residents struggling under high drug prices to make elected officials see the heavy toll of high-priced drugs.
Among those residents is John Darby, 48, a married father of two with a rare blood cancer. For a decade, he’s relied on a daily injection to manage his illness. Its price is $5,200 per month.
“This is the only medication available at this time that keeps him healthy enough to work, be a father and stay alive,” said Helen Darby, his wife.
The bill would:
A partner bill, HB1194, is expected to be introduced March 6.
Patients For Affordable Drugs NOW does not accept donations from organizations that profit from the development or distribution of prescription drugs.
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DENVER — The introduction of HB1260, The Drug Price Transparency Act of 2018, brings Coloradans one step closer to lowering drug prices. The legislation is strongly endorsed by Patients For Affordable Drugs NOW, a bipartisan national patient organization focused on policies to lower drug prices. P4ADNOW announced plans to educate, activate, and mobilize Colorado patients in support of the bill.
The group will create online tools that help patients contact elected officials in support of the bill, and it will amplify the voices of Coloradans struggling under high drug prices to make elected officials see the heavy toll of high-priced drugs.
“No one in Colorado should have to choose between affording a life-saving drug and putting food on the table, but that is exactly what Colorado patients report to us,” said David Mitchell, a cancer patient whose drugs cost $450,000 per year and the Founder of Patients For Affordable Drugs NOW. “Colorado patients tell us devastating stories of skipping doses, cutting pills in half, and going into bankruptcy due to the skyrocketing price of prescription drugs. That’s why this bill is so critical.”
Retired nurse Margaret Wright-Mueller is among those Coloradans hurting under skyrocketing drug costs and rooting for the transparency bill.
“I worked in the ICU for 44 years. I took care of patients, especially Medicare patients. They often cried and said they could not afford their meds or needed to cut their food bill,” said Wright-Mueller. “Now, I am struggling in the same ways.”
Wright-Mueller is one of more than 300 Colorado patients who have shared stories with Patients For Affordable Drugs NOW.
HB1260 would shed much-needed light on drug prices by requiring drug corporations to justify price hikes to state officials. If passed, drug corporations won’t be able to blindside Colorado patients with arbitrary price hikes. The transparency bill would:
This move toward transparency can help further discussions over how we can address prices in the long term.
Patients For Affordable Drugs NOW does not accept donations from organizations that profit from the development and distribution of prescription drugs.
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