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Nicole Crisano, PTNN. This weekly video program provides our readers with an in-depth review of the latest news, product approvals, FDA rulings and more.

The National Community Pharmacists Association and the Arkansas Pharmacists Association have filed an amici curiae brief in the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit in support of the state of Arkansas and against a challenge by the Pharmaceutical Care Management Association to Act 900, passed by the Arkansas General Assembly in 2015. The ongoing legal battle has prevented Arkansas from implementing a more transparent system under which pharmacy benefit managers determine generic prescription drug reimbursements to pharmacies. In response, NCPA...issued the following statement:..."The Arkansas legislature approved Act 900 because it recognized that PBMs' secretive approach to determining generic prescription drug reimbursement was unfair to pharmacies and patients. Pharmacies deserve to know what their reimbursement will be for a medication, and that they can at least break-even on what they dispense. That's the kind of essential transparency Act 900 enacted. PCMA seems less interested in fairness and more interested in filling PBM corporations' pockets. They continue to spout specious arguments that would undermine legislators' intent...

Kaitlyn Ellie, PTNN. This weekly video program provides our readers with an in-depth review of the latest news, product approvals, FDA rulings and more.

A bipartisan group of state attorneys general announced...that they are jointly investigating the marketing and sales practices of drug companies that manufacture opioid painkillers at the center of a national addiction epidemic...Attorneys general from states including Massachusetts, Texas, Illinois and Pennsylvania announced the investigation two weeks after Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine sued five drug manufacturers for misrepresenting the risks of opioids...We are looking into what role, if any, marketing and related practices might have played in the increasing prescription and use of these powerful and addictive drugs…Officials did not specify which companies were under investigation...

An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth — a life for a lab book?...In the past few months, China has announced two new crackdowns on research misconduct — one of which could lead to executions for scientists who doctor their data...Scientists have been sounding alarms for years about the integrity of research in China. One recent survey estimated that 40 percent of biomedical papers by Chinese scholars were tainted by misconduct. Funding bodies there have in the past announced efforts to crack down on fraud, including clawing back money from scientists who cheat on their grants...Chinese...Ministry of Science and Technology proclaimed a "no tolerance" policy for research misconduct — although it’s not clear what that might look like...the mass retractions "seriously harmed the international reputation of our country’s scientific research and the dignity of Chinese scientists at large."...courts approved a new policy calling for stiff prison sentences for researchers who fabricate data in studies that lead to drug approvals. If the misconduct ends up harming people, then the punishment on the table even includes the death penalty...

Martin Shkreli, the pharmaceutical entrepreneur vilified as the "pharma bro" for raising the price of a life-saving drug by 5,000 percent, will go on trial...for what U.S. prosecutors called a Ponzi-like scheme at his former hedge fund and a drug company he once ran…The charges that led to his arrest in December 2015...focus on Shkreli's management at Retrophin and the hedge fund MSMB Capital Management between 2009 and 2012...Prosecutors said Shkreli lied about MSMB's finances to lure investors and concealed devastating trading losses from them. They said he paid the investors back with money stolen from Retrophin…

The...Food and Drug Administration moved...to prevent pharmaceutical companies from "gaming" the system to block or delay entry of generic rivals…FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb said...that the agency plans to hold a public meeting...to identify ways pharmaceutical companies are using FDA rules to place obstacles in the way of generic competition..."We know that sometimes our regulatory rules might be 'gamed' in ways that may delay generic drug approvals beyond the time frame the law intended, in order to reduce competition,"..."We are actively looking at ways our rules are being used and, in some cases, misused."...These obstacles can include limiting the availability of branded products for testing by generic companies, or prolonging negotiations with generic companies over the implementation of shared risk-management programs...

A lawyer for one of the country's largest manufacturers of prescription painkillers says the public has "no right of access" to the testimony of its former president about how the company marketed the dangerously addictive OxyContin...The Kentucky attorney general's office sued Purdue Pharma in 2007, accusing it of misleading the public about just how addictive the opioid-based painkiller really was. They said that helped fuel a wave of addiction in Appalachia and beyond that cost the state millions of dollars in health care costs...Former Democratic Attorney General Jack Conway settled the case in 2015 for $24 million with an agreement to keep some court documents hidden from public view. They included a deposition from Richard Sackler, a former Purdue Pharma president and member of the family that still controls the company. His testimony could offer important insights into how much the company knew about the drug's addictive qualities.

Laura Joszt, assistant managing editor at The American Journal of Managed Care. Welcome to This Week in Managed Care from the Managed Markets News Network

The highest court of the European Union ruled…that courts can consider whether a vaccination led to someone developing an illness even when there is no scientific proof…The decision was issued…in relation to the case of a Frenchman known as Mr. J.W., who was immunized against hepatitis B in late 1998-99. About a year later, Mr. J.W. was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. In 2006, he and his family sued vaccine-maker Sanofi Pasteur in an attempt to be compensated for the damage they claim he suffered due to the vaccine. Mr. J.W. died in 2011… the EU's top court said that despite the lack of scientific consensus on the issue, a vaccine could be considered defective if there was "specific and consistent evidence," including the time between a vaccine's administration and the onset of a disease, an individual's previous state of health, the lack of any family history of the disease and a significant number of reported cases of the disease occurring following vaccination.