By

379578415631009

12
May
2021

Aducanumab & the Alzheimer’s Moonshot: What Would It Be Worth to Keep Your Mind?

Have you ever met someone with Alzheimer’s disease? Odds are you probably have. Odds are that question calls to mind the face of a beloved grandparent, neighbor, or family friend whom you’ve stopped by to visit, nervously clenching a bouquet of flowers. You greet them hopefully and wonder if they’ll remember you this time. America’s population is aging. About 6.2...
Read More
24
Aug
2020

Insurance Reform, Not Executive Orders, Is the Best Tool to Protect U.S. Patients and U.S. Pharmaceutical Innovation

With today’s Aug. 24 deadline looming, it’s important to explain how President Trump’s “most favored nations” executive order to purportedly lower drug prices would actually backfire, and hurt patients both at home and abroad. The order, which ties prices for certain drugs paid for by Medicare to the lowest prices paid in other countries, including Canada and much of Europe,...
Read More
23
Jul
2020

When Raising Drug Prices Helps Patients

Sometimes there are good, patient-friendly reasons to raise drug prices. Proposed legislation that aims to eliminate price hikes on prescription drugs will have unintended consequences. San Francisco-based Jaguar Health, for two years in a row, lost more than $30 million a year. Revenue from its only product, a diarrhea treatment for HIV patients, was only $5.8 million in 2019. The...
Read More
10
Jul
2020

The Remdesivir Pricing Letter Gilead Should Have Written

Dear America, We’ve decided to grossly underprice remdesivir. Hundreds of thousands of COVID-19 patients in America, and even more around the world, need our drug. But the US insurance system is corrupt and heartless. It has demonstrated that it will go to great lengths to prevent patients from getting appropriate, physician-prescribed treatments. You know their tricks: high deductibles, high copays,...
Read More
13
May
2020

If Trikafta Isn’t Good Enough for ICER, What Drug Is?

Last week ICER released a report concluding that Vertex’s groundbreaking triple-combination cystic fibrosis (CF) drug, Trikafta, is too expensive for the value it provides to patients. By all scientific and clinical standards—including ICER’s own—Trikafta, a novel combination of a CFTR potentiator and two correctors, is a transformative drug. It compensates for a mutation present in 90% of all CF patients, turning a disease...
Read More