“Everybody suffers, except the Mylan investors”, said Sabrina Corlette of Georgetown University’s Health Policy Institute. “Everybody suffers, except the Mylan investors”.
Advertisement
That comes on the heels of all the criticism the company has faced in recent days about the emergency allergy device’s skyrocketing price – from about $100 in 2007 to more than $600 today.
He has applauded Mylan’s actions. The first is the creation of drug tiers by insurers that made the out-of-pocket cost of premium brands more expensive, and the second is the expiration of a whole bunch of patents that made it more hard for brand names to compete with generics on price.
“Had we reduced the list price, I couldn’t ensure that everyone who needs an EpiPen gets one”, she said.
The drug is used by patients with severe allergies, as well as public schools and some government institutions. Roughly 40 million Americans have severe allergies to spider bites, bee stings and foods like nuts, eggs and shellfish.
The enquiry from members of Congress hits a little close to home for at least one senator – Mylan’s CEO, Heather Bresch, is the daughter of Sen.
Clinton said Wednesday that pharmaceutical and biotech industries can fuel American innovation, and combat debilitating diseases. “It’s wrong when drug companies put profits ahead of patients, raising prices without justifying the value behind them”, she wrote.
“It was never intended that a consumer, the patients would be paying list price. This is a health care issue”. Similarly, Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), who has called for both a congressional hearing and a Federal Trade Commission probe into the company, called Mylan’s announcement “welcome”, but said it “won’t fully address the root of the problem”.
That stance brought a wave of new money from investors who drove Mylan’s shares up more than 2 per cent in morning trading, while major US indexes slipped.
“Pharmaceutical companies have long defended the high price of drugs as necessary to pay for the research and development of new drugs, but the differences in pricing essentially means that consumers in the US are contributing more than those in other countries”. That brought in sales of almost $1.7 billion for Mylan. “What happens when the coupon is no longer offered?”
On Aug. 25, Mylan announced that it would help alleviate the outrageous out-of-pocket cost of EpiPens by providing patients with a $300 savings card, which would cover half the cost of a two-pack, Reuters reports. The company also said it would double the eligibility for its patient assistance program, eliminating out-of-pocket costs for patients who are uninsured and underinsured.
These measures could provide significant help for people with no coverage facing the full bill. The rest goes to pharmacy benefit managers, insurers, wholesalers and retail pharmacies. According to David Maris, Mylan has hiked prices for ursodiol, a generic medication to treat gallstones, by 542 percent; metoclopramide, which treats gastroesophageal reflux, by 444 percent; dicyclomine, used to treat irritable bowel syndrome by 400 percent, and tolterodine, which treats overactive bladders by 56 percent.
Advertisement
What do you think about Mylan CEO Heather Bresch’s statements that EpiPen price hikes are making the “world a better place?”
