Our partners at Consumer Reports Magazine say doctors can prescribe another kind of auto-injector that can cost hundreds of dollars less.
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The prices insurers and employers negotiate with Mylan are up about 150% since 2009, according to Rx Savings Solutions, and 15% since May.
Jackie Davis of Newport News, Va., and her husband, Cory, recently moved from health coverage through the military, which covered all costs for their son Michael’s EpiPens and asthma inhalers, to a commercial plan with a $6,000 deductible. Blumenthal and Klobuchar are calling for a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing and a Federal Trade Commission investigation into possible antitrust violations at Mylan.
For families wherein the children are the allergy sufferers, multiple family members are encouraged to carry multiple EpiPens – fresh and unexpired – in case of an emergency.
“It’s very hard to even prescribe it because there is a lot of sticker shock at the pharmacy”, said Friedman.
“I think the drug company is taking advantage of a monopoly, and I think it’s terribly unfortunate that it’s hurting patients’ health; it’s putting them at risk for death”, said Dr. Sullivan.
“Over the last several years, Mylan Pharmaceuticals has increased the price of EpiPens by more than 400%”.
Now comes news of a large price hike for EpiPens, at a time when families are already spending a lot on back-to-school.
Northern Kentucky mom Holly Lahner said “no I can not, nor would I feel safe with them carry a syringe like that”.
In this Friday, July 8, 2016 photo, a pharmacist holds a package of EpiPens, an epinephrine autoinjector for the treatment of allergic reactions, in Sacramento, Calif. Price hikes for the emergency medicine have made its maker, Mylan, the latest target for patients and politicians infuriated by soaring drug prices. Different pharmacies buy and sell prescription drugs at different costs, but Dinglewood now pays more than $730 for EpiPens that just a few years ago cost them $60.
She has also sharply criticized Turing Pharmaceuticals for raising the price of an antiviral medication commonly used by AIDS patients and pregnant women, to $750 from $13.50 a tablet.
Republican Senator Chuck Grassley, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, wrote Mylan earlier in the week to ask for an explanation of the price change. It’s the first time Dollars 259 will be stocked with the medication.
“What constitutes something to double?” she wanted to know. But she wasn’t thinking about their situation. However, Baker said the drug company is “less than three or five percent of our overall revenue” and the funding “just goes for activities”.
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And one product is seen as the best hope to stop the reaction, an EpiPen. “People are dying and they’re getting sicker and sicker”.
