- Self-translating pharmaceutical labels from Third Aurora could disrupt industry (chaindrugreview.com)
New technology, enabling consumers to read packaging labels written in any language, will become the norm for the pharmaceutical industry within 12 months...A prototype video, shown on the Third Aurora website, demonstrates the solution with a prototype package being translated from English to Spanish, German, Russian, and Japanese...Behind the scenes, two technologies are at work. According to Chaffey, “Artificial intelligence reads and interprets the content and augmented reality projects the new text back onto the label.”...READ MORE
- September 27 Pharmacy Week in Review (pharmacytimes.com)
Nicole Grassano, PTNN, Pharmacy Week in Review, this weekly video program provides our readers with an in-depth review of the latest news, product approvals, FDA rulings and more.
- Pessimism swirls around chances of Pelosi’s drug prices plan passing Congress (fiercehealthcare.com)Speaker Nancy Pelosi releases plan to give Medicare drug negotiating power (fiercehealthcare.com)
While insurer and hospital groups cheered House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s new drug prices plan, other experts and groups are skeptical of the bill’s chances of ever reaching President Donald Trump...The ambitious plan...drew plaudits from hospital and pharmacy benefit manager groups and fierce opposition from pharma. But major opposition from Republican members of the GOP-controlled Senate could doom the proposal, some experts and groups said...Republicans have blasted the proposal that calls for the Department of Health and Human Services to identify up to 250 brand-name drugs that do not have a lot of competition and aren’t driving up spending...HHS would then negotiate with the makers of those drugs to determine a fair price that Medicare and commercial payers would pay. The price would be linked to an average paid by several developed countries such as Germany and France...READ MORE
- Purveyors Of Black-Market Pharmaceuticals Target Immigrants (khn.org)
The bootleg medications were smuggled across the border and sold to mostly Latino immigrants in public spaces throughout Los Angeles — at swap meets, parks, beauty salons and makeshift stands outside mom-and-pop grocery stores...The drugs were cheap, and the customers — mostly from Mexico and Central America — did not need prescriptions to buy them. Some of the products featured brand names and colorful packaging that immigrants knew well from their home countries…Many were sheer counterfeits. Others, though legal south of the border, were not approved for sale in the United States. Some had expired. Still others would have been legal if sold by people licensed to do so — but none of the sellers held pharmacist licenses or any other medical credential...READ MORE
- This Week in Managed Care: September 27, 2019 (ajmc.com)
Laura Joszt, Managing Editor at The American Journal of Managed Care. Welcome to This Week in Managed Care from the Managed Markets News Network
- Pharma companies admit to sharing ‘sensitive’ info to keep prices high (fiercepharma.com)
As U.S. officials press a massive case for alleged generic drug price fixing, authorities in the U.K. have unearthed an example of rivals working a little too closely with each other...King Pharmaceuticals and Alissa Healthcare Research, which both sold the antidepressant drug nortriptyline, admitted to exchanging "commercially sensitive information" in order to keep prices high...The U.K.'s Competition and Markets Authority said...it had found the companies exchanged info about prices, volumes and market entry plans for their drugs...READ MORE
- Unregulated market emerges for sale of diabetic test strips (reviewjournal.com)
Becoming temporarily blind in 2015 was Robert Hoey’s wake-up call to take control of his Type 1 diabetes... Now he’s diligent in monitoring his glucose levels...Medicaid will only pay for him to receive 100 test strips a month, and Hoey typically uses anywhere from 180 to 210...he often purchases the remaining test strips he needs from what experts describe as a mostly unregulated — and potentially dangerous — gray market of entrepreneurs flipping pre-owned test strips...The chemical mixture on a test strip used to measure blood sugar can be damaged by heat or moisture. And unlike with licensed pharmacies, the Nevada State Board of Pharmacy does not regularly inspect flippers’ operations to ensure products are being properly stored. There’s also the potential of expired or counterfeit test strips being sold...READ MORE
- Amid a political firestorm over pharma’s pricing, net prices actually fell last quarter: report (fiercepharma.com)
Politicians and headlines regularly describe U.S. drug prices as “skyrocketing." But new data from analysts at SSR Health show prices haven't been growing as fast as they were—and the amount payers actually shell out is falling...In the second quarter, list prices in the U.S. grew 3.1%, compared with a 4.6% increase during the same period last year. After rebates, prices fell 5.8% during the second quarter, compared with a 6.1% drop after rebates during last year’s second quarter...The net pricing changes typically reflect a mix of increases and decreases across the industry—among various products, companies and market segments—but this time around, “literally no products, companies, or market segments" displayed big net price increases...READ MORE
- Half-Off Sale! Five Major Drugmakers Reveal Vast Gross-to-Net Price Gaps—and Why Rebate Reform Is Still Needed
Five of the largest pharmaceutical manufacturers—Eli Lilly, Janssen, Merck, Novartis, and Sanofi—have now publicly reported the 2018 gross and net price changes for their U.S. product portfolios, along with average discounts from list price…These reports shed light on the heated political rhetoric and policy proposals that focus on drugs’ list prices. The reality: brand-name drug makers sold their products at half of those list prices. As you will see, the five companies discounted their average list prices by 44% to 55%...READ MORE
- After 3 years, drugmakers are tired of Brexit—but they’re ready for it (fiercepharma.com)Drug and medical suppliers say Brexit freight plans needed urgently (reuters.com)
Pinder Sahota has a list, and he is checking it twice. As the U.K. lurches toward Brexit, the Novo Nordisk scientist has become a logistics expert to ensure there is no break in the insulin supply chain when the separation finally happens...The company has tripled its warehouse capacity and stuffed it with 3.8 million packs of insulin, enough to last more than four months. New routes have been plotted to avoid the ports and crossings expected to be the most congested...READ MORE