Mylan CEO Heather Bresch got a tongue-lashing from Congress. Lawmakers grilled Bresch for hours, accusing her company of jacking up the price of EpiPens to make a bigger profit.
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Bresch said that although she regretted that some patients had trouble paying for the drug, lawmakers needed to recognize that Mylan had greatly increased access to the lifesaving device.
Bresch also said that the company will be making less profit on the generic than the branded EpiPen, despite only making it available through direct shipments to consumers, since “there are still fees, rebates and discounts on the generic channel, they’re just not as significant”. Similar hearings were held in the previous year with executives from Turing Pharmaceuticals and Valeant Pharmaceuticals International, companies that also sharply raised prices on some drugs.
Ms. Bresch told a House committee that the company profited far less than the almost $609 list price for a pack of two might suggest, making $100 a pack after rebates and other costs. She emphasized that the company plans a half-price version of the device, that it provides them free to many schools and said that Mylan’s generic medications combined have saved the USA healthcare system $180 billion in costs over a decade.
Congressman Elijah Cummings of Maryland is the ranking member on the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. Chuck Grassley, the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, has written several letters to Mylan demanding answers. They described themselves as upset both about the price increases as well Chief Executive Officer Heather Bresch’s $19.4 million in awarded pay.
Duncan, like other Republicans, said the free market is not working in this case because Mylan has a virtual monopoly over auto-injected epinephrine.
Bresch tried to deflect much of the criticism to the opaque nature of the US health care pricing system.
The embattled CEO argued she didn’t anticipate the financial burdens patients would face due the the sharp rise in costs, adding the company plans to put out a generic version at half the cost.
During the hearing, Bresch was asked about Mylan benefiting from her mother Gayle Manchin’s push for state boards of education to stock EpiPens while she was head of the National Association of State Boards of Education in 2012. “They raised the prices, for the reason being, I believe, to get filthy rich at the expense of our constituents”.
Ms. Bresch is scheduled to testify Wednesday afternoon before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee about the price increases. “Price and access exist in a balance, and we believe we have struck that balance”.
Mulvaney then turned to Bresch, telling her Mylan is getting what it deserves.
Also on Tuesday, West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey said he was investigating the rebates and the possibility that Mylan violated the state’s antitrust law when it sued and settled with a would-be generic competitor.
A review of Mylan profits by David Maris, a pharmaceutical analyst at Wells Fargo, shows that the unit that markets EpiPen increased its operating profit margin from 8.8% in 2008 to 60.3% in 2016. Bresch says roughly 4 million packs. “No one here has any clue if you’re charging too much or too little”, he said, referencing the complexity of the pricing system. She also claimed her $18 million pay previous year was “in the middle” of compensation packages in the biopharma industry.
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“Sounds like you’re doing pretty well on this”, said Rep. John Mica, R-Fla. But the company said earlier this year that regulators had found problems with its application.
