Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Viewpoints: It's Time To Stop Drug Companies From 'Gaming The System And Gaming The Rules'
USA Today: Stop Big Pharma From 'Getting Away With Murder'
Few things are more infuriating to consumers than the constant, surging increases in drug prices. Americans under 65 are projected to pay an additional 11.6% this year, while seniors are expected to see increases of 9.9%. These increases follow similar ones in recent years. Price hikes like these, which run well above inflation and wage growth year after year, are a keen indication of how the drug industry lacks market fundamentals. Or, as President Trump put it Monday, prescription drug prices "are out of control" and the big pharmaceutical companies "are getting away with murder." (10/16)
Bloomberg: Here's How Drug Companies Game The Patent System
The Senate Health Committee held a hearing Tuesday morning about why prescription drugs cost so much and what might done to make them more affordable. According to the committee’s website, the witnesses include a lobbyist for the pharmaceutical industry, a lobbyist for the pharmacy industry and a lobbyist for the pharmacy benefits-management industry. (Joe Nocera, 10/17)
USA Today: PhRMA: We’re Working To Protect Patients
Ensuring patient access to medicines that are revolutionizing how we fight disease is critically important. Equally so is understanding when additional safeguards are required to ensure a medicine’s benefits outweigh its risks. In such cases, the Food and Drug Administration may require the biopharmaceutical company that manufactures the medicine to implement additional procedures, called Risk Evaluation and Mitigation Strategies (REMS), to facilitate safe use of the medicine. (James C. Stansel, 10/16)
Forbes: The Cost Of Developing Drugs Is Insane. That Paper That Says Otherwise Is Insanely Bad
You probably know this poem, or at least the story it tells. One man likens the elephant to a wall, another to a spear, a third to a snake, a fourth to a tree. The point is that each sees only part of the animal, and is thereby deceived. Well, here’s how the same thing happened when it came to a new estimate of the cost of developing a new medicine. For years, the pharmaceutical industry has relied on estimates from the Tufts Center for the Study of Drug Development, the most recent of which that puts the cost of bringing a medicine from invention to pharmacy shelves at $2.7 billion. Last month, two cancer researchers grabbed headlines by asserting that estimate is way off. Their number, published in JAMA Internal Medicine: $648 million. In an editorial that ran alongside the new study, journalist Merrill Goozner wrote: “Policymakers can safely take steps to rein in drug prices without fear of jeopardizing innovation.” There are reasons to think that (more on that later), but this paper does not add to them. (Matthew Harper, 10/16)
The Hill: The Future Of Drug Pricing: Value Over Volume
Doctors and hospitals are increasingly being paid not for the quantity of care they provide, but for the outcome or quality of care patients receive. The emerging trend in health care is about rewarding value, rather than volume. This is the future, where there is less focus on the number of tests or treatments a patient receives and more focus on whether a patient’s health is improving. (Jim Greenwood, 10/11)
Stat: Canada Needs A National Registry Of Drug Company Payments To Doctors
The province of Ontario recently took a historic step for Canada by introducing legislation that would shine a light on interactions between drug companies and prescribers. The use of the term “historic” here is not hyperbole, since the extent of payments towards physicians in Canada has never been known. Other countries, such as the United States and France, have been making such information public for a few years now. But Ontario’s bill would provide a wider scope of transparency by including all sorts of prescribers — not just doctors — into the mix, and even bringing in medical device companies. (Nav Persaud, Joel Lexchin and Andrew S. Boozary, 10/17)
The Columbus Dispatch: Ohioans Should Vote No On Issue 2
Tens of millions of dollars are being spent on advertising for and against Issue 2, the “Drug Price Relief Act.” After all this, Ohioans remain confused about this proposed voter-initiated law on the Nov. 7 ballot — a wishful scheme that aims to force the state to buy drugs at unattainable discounts. The muddle is understandable. Ohioans are being told to vote for one thing, but are being sold a bill of goods on another. Its merits shaky, Issue 2 campaigns against a straw man: Big Pharma. (10/18)
Columbus Dispatch: Should Ohioans Support The Drug Price Relief Act? Yes
As a Vietnam veteran and former head of the United States Veterans Administration, I have spent most of my life advocating for veterans. And I’m not stopping now. One of the biggest challenges now facing Ohio families and veterans is posed by the out-of-control pharmaceutical drug industry. This industry has been and continues ripping off Ohio veterans and taxpayers daily by selling our government agencies — including Medicaid — drugs at outrageous prices. (Max Cleland, 10/16)
The Courier: No On Issue 2
High drug costs are a national issue, not just an Ohio one. But voters statewide will get to weigh in on the Ohio Drug Relief Act, Issue 2, on Nov. 7. The run-up to the election, and the outcome, will be closely watched throughout the country.Issue 2, if approved, would create a new law requiring state agencies in Ohio to not pay more for prescription drugs than the federal Department of Veterans Affairs. It also would require state payment of attorney fees and expenses to specific individuals for defense of the law.The issue, which was brought about through an initiative petition signed by nearly 200,000 Ohioans, pits a California health care CEO against Big Pharma in a state which would become the first to directly take on the drug price problem if the issue is approved. (10/18)
