The Week in Review in Prescription Drug Pricing

1. #DemandLowerListPrices

• As COVID-19 severely threatens the diabetes community’s health and finances, more than 60 people with diabetes and Patients For Affordable Drugs penned an open letter demanding lower list prices on insulin. — (P4AD)

2. Preparation + Opportunity

• The global pandemic has put a lot of Congressional goals on the backburner this spring. But with millions of Americans facing pay cuts and layoffs, it’s more urgent than ever to address exorbitant drug prices, and Congress still has a great opportunity to act come fall. — (STAT)

3. Put a Cap On It

• Following the lead of several other states, Washington approved a bill that would limit out-of-pocket costs for insulin to $100 for a 30-day supply. While the Big 3 insulin manufacturers should drop the price for all people with diabetes, this is a start. — (The Seattle Times)

1. “Drugs don’t work if people can’t afford them”

• P4AD founder and cancer patient, David Mitchell, writes about how the growing crisis around COVID-19 brings into stark view America’s broken drug pricing system. — (Patients For Affordable Drugs)

2. Taxpayers left to foot the bill

• Facing a wave of public criticism and accusations of profiteering, drug maker Gilead backpedalled its request for orphan drug designation for a potential coronavirus drug that would have blocked competition, allowed tax breaks, and boosted their profits. — (The New York Times)

3. Prices Slashed

• Rising Pharmaceuticals, makers of the touted potential coronavirus drug, chloroquine, rolled back a price hike from the beginning of the year. It goes to show price gouging happens all the time, and must be curbed all the time, pandemic or no pandemic. — (STAT)

4. Drug prices continue to soar

• A new study revealed that brand drug prices have increased three times faster than the rate of inflation even when you factor in discounts they give to insurers. More than ever, we need drug pricing reform. — (WESA)

5. Buying policies to put profits over patients

• Kaiser Health News dug into FEC filings and found that Senators working to advance pro-Pharma proposals were the recipients of hefty campaign donations from pharmaceutical manufacturer-associated PACs. — (Kaiser Health News)

1. Step in the Right Direction

• A recent CBO score estimates that the Prescription Drug Pricing Reduction Act would save nearly $95 billion in the next decade. The landmark legislation would establish a new Part D out-of-pocket cap and penalize drug companies for increasing prices higher than the rate of inflation. — (Healthcare Dive)

2. A Mitchell Minute

• P4AD’s very own David Mitchell spoke with The Heartland Institute’s Health Care News podcast to discuss the bipartisan Prescription Drug Pricing Reduction Act and why we all should support it. — (The Heartland Institute)

3. Iowa Republican leader calls for action on Senate Finance drug pricing bill

• Laura Kaminenski, chairperson of the Linn County Republican Committee, called on Sen. McConnell to support Sens. Grassley and Ernst by bringing the Senate Finance bill to the floor for a vote. We couldn’t agree more. — (Des Moines Register)

4. Business as Usual

• Despite an ever-growing insulin affordability crisis, the head of Eli Lilly received a massive pay increase, making him one of the highest-paid pharma CEOs. — (Fierce Pharma)

5. Sticker Shock

• Patients across the country are finding that their insurance plans are covering fewer and fewer of their drugs. For some, there is no generic option and, thanks to high list prices, the out-of-pocket costs can be staggering. — (NPR)

Wash your hands and catch up on drug pricing news!

1. Done being silent

• Millennials with lifelong chronic illnesses need never-ending care and face alarmingly high and rising health care costs. That’s why members of this generation are speaking up to advocate for change across health care, including lowering drug prices. — (Teen Vogue)

2. Too much pain to smile

• Scarlett Woodard, of Georgia, can’t afford the pricey drug Lyrica to combat her chronic pain, and as a result, it hurts too much for her to smile. That’s why Woodard pushed back against the rigged system in a letter to her local paper, encouraging Congress to pass the Prescription Drug Pricing Reduction Act. — (Albany Herald)

3. Address insulin list prices

• The Trump Administration proposed a program that aims to lower out-of-pocket costs for some Medicare beneficiaries. It’s not enough; we must address the skyrocketing list prices of insulin, the headwaters of the drug pricing crisis. — (The New York Times)

4. There are solutions

• P4AD Founder David Mitchell talks with podcast host and oncologist Chadi Nabhan. The two discuss solutions to lower drug prices, from reforming the U.S. patent system to pricing new gene therapies fairly. — (Outspoken Oncology)

5. Yes, it can be done

• Joe Grogan, director of the White House Domestic Policy Council, penned an op-ed this week urging Congress to come together to pass drug pricing reform legislation. Yet again the administration endorsed thePrescription Drug Pricing Reduction Act, which would rein in drug price hikes and help seniors afford vital medications. Let’s get it done! — (WSJ)

Slow news week. ?

 
1. Debunked

• A new analysis published in JAMA undercuts one of pharma’s most misleading figures. All told, four studies and a handful of editorials in the influential journal’s special issue show there is plenty of room to reduce prices, maintain R&D, and provide a fair profit for these companies. — (BioPharma Dive) 

2. Shareholders before R&D

• A ? new analysis from Axios shows Big Pharma used a tax windfall to juice executive and investor payoffs instead of investing in R&D or lowering drug prices. May the data help fuel reforms. — (Axios) 

3. We want our money back, Mallinckrodt

• The Justice Department is suing Mallinckrodt, accusing it of defrauding Medicaid out of hundreds of millions of dollars in rebates for its blockbuster drug Acthar Gel. The drug has also cost Medicare billions and families in the epilepsy community have dealt with a 97,000 percent price spike since 2001.  — (FiercePharma)

4. Guilty!

• A Novartis generics unit will pay a $195 million fine — the largest the DOJ has ever levied — in a federal antitrust suit. Oh, and as part of the resolution, the pharmaceutical corporation could share with the feds its dealings with co-conspirators. — (AP)

5. Attorneys take on drug prices

• In Texas, the Harris County Attorney filed a lawsuit accusing generic drug manufacturers of price fixing. Meanwhile, California Attorney General Xavier Becerra filed an amicus brief arguing for state regulation of pharmacy benefit managers. — (Houston Chronicle)

Leaping to lower drug prices like.

1. Senators: Pass this bill!

• Patients For Affordable Drugs Now launched a new campaign calling on senators to support the Trump-backed Prescription Drug Pricing Reduction Act (S. 2543). The legislation would rein in runaway drug price spikes and lower medicine costs for seniors. — (BioPhamra Dive)

2. Wrong answer

• Secretary Azar told members of Congress this week he couldn’t guarantee an affordable coronavirus vaccine. Vaccines don’t work if patients can’t afford them! The Secretary appeared to walk back his remarks the following day. — (The Washington Post & Twitter)

3. Shifty

• Drug maker Gilead is about to lose exclusivity on its HIV prevention drug Truvada. Determined to pad profits, they’re pretending their new PrEP drug, Descovy, is more effective. It’s not. — (STAT)

4. “Read the polls,” the voters want lower drug prices NOW

• Two top advisers to President Trump told GOP senators that they ought to lower drug prices ahead of the 2020 election. Good advice, please take it, Congress! — (The Hill)

5. “It’s still somebody’s money.”

• An Oregon father pushed back hard so his family and insurer would not have to pay an unnecessarily high drug price to help his little girl. We commend him for standing up and speaking out. — (KHN)

 
1. Patients Take a Stand

• P4AD Advocates Emma, Randall, Savanna, and Emily were proud to support Sen. John Cornyn’s bipartisan bill — the Affordable Prescriptions for Patients Act — in Fort Worth, Texas this week. Let’s keep the momentum going! — (Twitter) 

2. ISO Insulin

• Patients are turning to the black market to afford insulin, a drug as vital to millions of Americans with diabetes as water. — (Reuters) 

3. How PhRMA Lost its Mojo

• Pressure from patients to lower prescription drug prices has loosened the drug industry’s death grip on DC. Bipartisan proposals hold promise for meaningful reform in 2020 in this new era of drug pricing reform. — (The Wall Street Journal)

4. Time to Crack Down

• Seventy-eight percent of drugs associated with new patents are NOT NEW DRUGS. The poster child for patent abuse, AbbVie’s Humira, shows how far a drug maker will go to abuse the system at patient expense. Reform. Needed. Yesterday. — (The National Law Review)

5. The Harder They Fall

• A federal probe into price fixing in the generics industry has ensnared a senior executive at Novartis’ generics unit. — (FiercePharma) 

What will come first? Clarity on the Iowa caucus results or lower drug prices?

 
1. Let’s Go

• This week’s State of the Union address gave a hat tip to the Prescription Drug Pricing Reduction Act, which could penalize price hikes and help seniors afford prescription drugs. Let’s get drug pricing reform over the finish line in 2020. — (USA Today) 

2. A Scam Cloaked in Benevolence 

• Week in Review scribe Juliana Keeping testified before the House Way and Means Health Subcommittee this week on the impact of high drug costs for patients — including her 7-year-old, who has cystic fibrosis. — (News 9) 

3. NEGOTIATE 

• If taxpayers negotiated for prescription drugs in Medicare like the VA already does, on insulin alone, we’d all save $4.4 billion in a year, a new analysis finds. — (STAT)

4. Smacked

• Activists and the U.S. government are smacking Big Pharma’s Gilead around in court. Taxpayer investment spurred HIV-preventive drugs, and patients are loosening Gilead’s decade-long grip on the drugs’ monopoly. — (VICE)

5. Top Issue

• Drug pricing is top-of-mind for 2020 voters. Hear from Clayton McCook, an Oklahoma dad whose daughter lives with Type 1 diabetes. The price of the insulin his 11-year-old needs to live has doubled since her diagnosis at age 3. — (Tradeoffs)