In Sign Of Increasing Threat Facing Industry, Big Pharma Spent A Record $27.5M On Lobbying In 2018
The lobbying numbers from the pharmaceutical industry's leading trade group reflect an industry under fire from all sides over its pricing practices, as well as its efforts to roll back changes to a Medicare program. The changes is expected to cost drugmakers as much as $1.9 billion in 2019. Meanwhile, there's a lot of money going toward influencing drug cost decisions, but it's not always clear who is behind the groups ponying up the cash.
Bloomberg:
Big Pharma Lobby Group Spent Record Amount As Reform Push Grows
The pharmaceutical industry’s leading trade group disclosed Tuesday that it had spent a record $27.5 million on lobbying in 2018, $1.4 million more than in 2009, when Congress and the White House created the Affordable Care Act, the health-care overhaul better known as Obamacare. The surge in spending by the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America came as the industry failed to win a last-minute legislative fix that would have reduced its share of outlays in a popular Medicare program, and as it prepared for what could be its most challenging year in decades. (Allison, 1/22)
Stat:
PhRMA Spent A Record $27.5 Million On Lobbying In 2018
The tally, as detailed in lobbying filings posted online on Tuesday, far outstrips the group’s previous record-setting spend, when it dropped a little more than $25 million in 2009, as Congress was deep in the debate over the Affordable Care Act. It spent just shy of that figure again in 2017. The group’s eye-popping 2018 spending — sums that support some two dozen internal lobbyists as well as a crowd of external contractors — is a sign of the increasingly existential threat the drug industry faces in Washington. The Trump administration has ramped up its efforts to address high prescription drug prices with a flurry of new regulations, and congressional lawmakers also spent the last year turning up the volume on their own criticism of the industry’s practices. PhRMA represents most of the nation’s largest drug companies, including Johnson & Johnson, Pfizer, and Merck. (Florko, 1/22)
The Washington Post:
Anonymous ‘Ghost Ship’ Is Among Groups Flooding Drug Pricing Debate
The political war over prescription drug practices is spawning a frenzy of activity by outside lobbying groups, some with names that mask their ties to industry and one that has gone to great lengths to disguise its origins. The increase in advertising, advocacy and pressure tactics is aimed at thwarting some efforts to control drug costs proposed in the Democratic-controlled House, such as allowing Medicare to negotiate drug prices, as well as ideas pursued by the Trump administration to curb prices. (Rowland and Stein, 1/22)
And, in other news —
The Hill:
Grassley To Test GOP On Lowering Drug Prices
Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) is giving Republicans an early test on their commitment to lowering drug prices. Legislation sponsored by the Senate Finance Committee chairman and Democratic Sen. Amy Klobuchar (Minn.) would allow people to buy prescription drugs from approved pharmacies in Canada. The bill is reigniting a long-simmering debate about drug importation, a proposal strongly opposed by the powerful pharmaceutical lobby. (Weixel and Hellmann, 1/21)
