- Drugmaker Gilead reaches multiyear agreement with White House to donate HIV prevention med (cnbc.com)Tension over generic entry sees Gilead donating 2.4m bottles of PrEP (in-pharmatechnologist.com)Gilead tries—and fails—to dodge lawsuit claiming it delayed safer HIV meds (fiercepharma.com)
Pharmaceutical giant Gilead Sciences has agreed to donate drugs that reduce the risk of HIV transmission for up to 200,000 people a year...The agreement between Gilead and the Trump administration will last until at least Dec. 31, 2025, and possibly through the end of 2030, Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar said in a statement...Gilead will donate its PrEP medication Truvada, which is used to reduce the risk of HIV infection and usually sells for $1,600 to $2,000 a month in the United States...The deal will “help us achieve our goal of ending the HIV epidemic in America!,” President Donald Trump said in a tweet...READ MORE
- This Week in Managed Care: May 3, 2019 (ajmc.com)
Samantha DiGrande, Welcome to This Week in Managed Care from the Managed Markets News Network
- More than 500 drugs saw price hikes in the first quarter, study shows (fiercehealthcare.com)GoodRx Quarterly Report: Q1 2019 (goodrx.com)
Researchers at GoodRx...found a 2.9% price hike across brand-name and generic drugs in the first quarter of 2019. Most of that was reported in the first week of January, when drugmakers often raise their prices...Large cities are where drug prices are often highest, GoodRx’s team found. Drugs cost nearly 17% more than the national average in New York City, 14% more in San Francisco and about 10% more in Los Angeles...Meanwhile, prices were lowest in Atlanta and Houston, where they were about 20% below the national average...READ MORE
- This Week in Managed Care: May 3, 2019 (ajmc.com)
Samantha DiGrande, Welcome to This Week in Managed Care from the Managed Markets News Network
- States’ lawsuit accuses generic-drug makers of fixing prices (latimes.com)Teva Pharmaceutical drops 16% after 44 states accuse drugmaker of conspiring to hike generic drug prices (cnbc.com)
Attorneys general from more than 40 states are alleging the nation's largest generic drug manufacturers conspired to artificially inflate and manipulate prices for more than 100 different generic drugs...filed in federal court in Connecticut, also names 15 individual senior executives responsible for sales, marketing and pricing...Connecticut Atty. Gen. William Tong...said investigators obtained evidence implicating 20 firms..."We have hard evidence that shows the generic drug industry perpetrated a multibillion-dollar fraud on the American people," Tong said. "We have emails, text messages, telephone records and former company insiders that we believe will prove a multiyear conspiracy to fix prices and divide market share for huge numbers of generic drugs."...READ MORE
- May 10 Pharmacy Week in Review: Nurses as Leaders in Health Care, DNA May Predict Treatment Resistance in Certain Patients (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.
- German health minister Spahn promotes use of ePrescriptions at the DMEA 2019 (healthcareitnews.com)
The ePrescription is intended to generate added value for patients in Germany - and to stimulate digitisation in the healthcare market...The ePrescription is to be established in Germany by 2020. In April, German health minister Jens Spahn spoke at the DMEA 2019 (formerly conhIT) in Berlin about its benefits and opportunities in Germany...discussed the...implementation and the added value resulting from ePrescription and other online services for digitising the German healthcare system... The e-recipe will bring real added value. If we combine it with on-line consultations or pharmacy delivery services, the range of services offered to patients will be extended to bring the digital component to healthcare...READ MORE
- Exclusive: Novartis pitches discounts on pricey gene therapy for deadly muscle disorder (reuters.com)
Novartis AG is offering price discounts in negotiations with U.S. health insurers on its gene therapy for spinal muscular atrophy, a treatment that could cost more than a million dollars, but the gesture comes with strings attached...The Swiss drugmaker wants insurers to commit to coverage for patients identified with the rare and often deadly disease...Novartis also seeks their support for widespread screening to identify newborns with SMA, and to ensure quick authorization for the gene therapy, with the aim of starting treatment within two weeks of diagnosis...The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is due to decide this month on approval for Novartis’ Zolgensma. Novartis, which has made a huge bet on gene therapy for future growth, says the one-time treatment could be a cure for SMA and is pushing for a price in the range of $1.5 million to $5 million. That would make Zolgensma the most expensive new therapy to date...READ MORE
- U.S. government to require drugmakers to show prices in TV ads (reuters.com)Price Check On Drug Ads: Would Revealing Costs Help Patients Control Spending? (khn.org)Now that Trump's forced drug prices into ads, what's next? Lawsuits and compliance, for two (fiercepharma.com)
The Trump administration...said it will require drugmakers to disclose the list price of prescription drugs in direct-to-consumer television advertisements, part of the government’s efforts to lower costs for U.S. consumers...The list price would be included if it is equal to or greater than $35 for a month’s supply or the usual course of therapy. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services said that the 10 most commonly advertised drugs have list prices ranging from $488 to $16,938 per month or usual course of therapy...TV advertising requirement would work to drive down list prices alongside a recently proposed rule aimed at requiring that drug rebates, or discounts, be passed on to Medicare patients when they buy the drugs...The advertising rule...was originally suggested as part of President Donald Trump’s “blueprint” to lower U.S. drug prices...READ MORE
- The State of Specialty Pharmacy 2019: Industry Trends and Photos from #Asembia19 (drugchannels.net)
FOUR TAKEAWAYS ON THE STATE OF SPECIALTY PHARMACY IN 2019
1) Specialty drugs continue to drive the pharmacy and PBM industries, though growth is slowing.
2) The larger independent specialty pharmacies are pulling ahead.
3) Many smaller independent pharmacies are struggling—and want to cash out.
4) Hospitals and health systems are battling—and partnering with—PBMs over specialty pharmacy
...READ MORE