Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Meet One Of The Pharmaceutical Industry's Most-Hated Foes
Stat: The Drug Pricing Crusader At The Center Of One Of The Nastiest Fights Of The Election Season
There’s nobody the drug companies are spending more to fight than Michael Weinstein. And Weinstein takes pride in their hostility. “That’s a badge of honor,” he said. A longtime HIV/AIDS activist, Weinstein is the driving force behind a drug price control initiative in California that could set a national precedent. It’s just the latest in a long string of legal and political fights he’s picked. (Robbins, 9/6)
The New York Times: Rising Drug Prices Put Big Pharma’s Lobbying To The Test
Drug makers have been getting their $2.3 billion worth in Washington. That is how much they have spent lobbying Congress over the last decade. It may help explain why no legislative proposal to rein in rising prescription prices has gone anywhere. The latest outcry involving Mylan will put that hefty investment in influence to its biggest test. (Chon, 9/1)
Modern Healthcare: Price Hikes Hamper Use Of Naloxone Against Opioids
The rising cost of naloxone—a 40-year-old drug that can reverse an opioid overdose—is prompting questions about the wisdom of allowing market forces to determine the price of a vital tool in the public health response to the nation's opioid crisis. Baltimore Health Commissioner Dr. Leana Wen told Modern Healthcare last week that the cost of naloxone has prevented her department from blanketing the city with the drug as she had hoped. (Johnson, 9/3)
Bloomberg: Struggling Vaccines From Novartis Turn Into Sales Boon For Glaxo
Outbreaks of the meningitis B disease in the U.S., along with the social-media frenzy that followed the death of a British toddler, have helped propel sales of GlaxoSmithKline Plc’s vaccine well past initial projections for its use. The U.K. drugmaker is poised to deliver nine times the 2016 sales Novartis AG had forecast for vaccines including the meningitis B shot Bexsero, said Thomas Breuer, chief medical officer at Glaxo’s vaccines division. Glaxo acquired the business in March 2015, and revenue for vaccines last year was five times what Novartis had estimated, Breuer said. (Gokhale, 8/31)
FiercePharma: Thanks, Mylan. Your EpiPen Pricing Saga Puts Pharma’s Winning Copay Coupons Under Interrogation
Question expensive stickers or price hikes, and drugmakers often point to their copay coupons and assistance programs that keep patients' costs low. Mylan certainly did last week, when its extreme EpiPen price hikes touched off a firestorm: It rolled out new copay assistance programs to douse the flames. Didn't work, unfortunately for Mylan--and unfortunately for the rest of the drugmakers that rely on copay discounts and other programs to woo patients to new brands or keep them on old ones when generics make their debuts. In fact, it stirred up Sen. Elizabeth Warren's curiosity. (Sagonowsky and Staton, 9/1)
Deseret News: It's Not Just EpiPens: Drug Prices Rising Across The Board
When it comes to the cost of managing her daughter's diabetes, Stacey Stocking says she feels like a "hostage." The West Valley City mother of three pays for an insurance plan that is half her mortgage. She has a $2,000 deductible. She stuck with her job at a bank, instead of quitting as planned seven years ago, because she and her husband need the insurance. So when Stocking saw the news about the EpiPen — and its triple, then quadruple, then quintuple price increases — her first reaction was outrage. Her second was fear. (Chen, 9/5)
