|
|
|
BIO’s CEO testifies in a hearing that highlights PBM abuses. Also, 52 conservative leaders oppose MFN in letter to Trump. (890 words, 3 minutes, 34 seconds) |
|
|
|
Middlemen under pressure as BIO CEO testifies in hearing on pharma supply chain
|
|
|
A House hearing featuring testimony from BIO President & CEO John F. Crowley identified pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) as the main cause of rising drug prices.
The hearing: Crowley emphasized a wide range of BIO priorities as the House Energy & Commerce Health Subcommittee on Feb. 11 focused on medicines during the second in a series of hearings on lowering health care costs. Witnesses represented the entire prescription drug supply chain.
Highlights from Crowley’s testimony:
On PBMs: “The United States is the only country in the world where 50% of every dollar spent on medicines goes to middlemen, mostly toward the PBMS.” Nearly all witnesses and many lawmakers agreed: PBM abuses inflate prices.
On Most Favored Nation (MFN) pricing: “We must remember that the United States already is the most favored nation when it comes to developing groundbreaking new medicines that transform the standard of care for patients.”
On the Food and Drug Administration (FDA): “We need a modernized and reformed FDA, and the core of that has to be the leadership and the staff. … We’ve seen reductions in force. And I’m hopeful, confident, that we’ll start to see more and more people coming to the FDA.”
On American biotech leadership: “The Chinese Communist Party’s regime is exerting greater control over pharmaceutical supply chains, data flows, and intellectual property. These actions threaten not only U.S. competitiveness, but also the long-term health security of American patients.”
On vaccines: “We are concerned about shifting standards. We need consistency and predictability from our regulatory bodies. Perhaps no biotechnology has done more to improve human health than vaccines.”
Read full coverage on Bio.News.
Watch Crowley’s opening statement.
Read Crowley’s written testimony. |
|
|
|
Conservative leaders, study: MFN would harm access and innovation without benefits |
|
|
Leaders of 52 conservative groups tell President Trump that Most Favored Nation (MFN) drug pricing will harm innovation without helping America in a Feb. 12 letter. Meanwhile, a study says Americans prefer a wider choice of treatments to price controls.
What’s MFN? A proposal to cap the price of America’s prescription drugs based on limits set in countries with price controls.
What the conservative leaders say: “In addition to doing nothing to address foreign freeloading, MFN would reduce access to new cures and reduce U.S. global competitiveness, ceding ground to China,” they write.
Their solution: “Instead, lawmakers should focus on reforms that unleash the free market and protect intellectual property rights, encouraging competition and innovation,” the letter says. “These policies lower drug costs over time while expanding patient choice and preserving incentives for lifesaving medical breakthroughs.”
What the study says: Foreign health technology assessments (HTAs) limit the drugs available based on fixed health care spending. “American patients prioritize access, autonomy, and diverse treatment impacts through market-based systems, whereas foreign HTAs constrain future investments in health within narrower government-determined frameworks,” per National Council of Pharmaceuticals research.
What BIO says: “Codification of MFN policies risks importing socialized medicine and harming much of what makes American biotech innovation exceptional, while failing to address the real drivers of the affordability crisis in our country," BIO President & CEO John F. Crowley told a Feb. 11 Congressional hearing.
Read more from BIO: Putting Americans First. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Washington Post editorial criticizes FDA decision to not review mRNA flu vaccine: “Moderna spent years and hundreds of millions of dollars developing a flu vaccine using the same technology that allowed the United States to produce covid-19 vaccines in record time. But now the drug company’s flu shots are not getting a fair shake from the Food and Drug Administration,” said the editorial. Read more here.
CMS Director Mehmet Oz urges Americans to take the measles vaccine as case numbers soar. “Take the vaccine, please,” Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) Director Oz, told CNN, adding, there “will never be a barrier to Americans getting access to the measles vaccine.” As of Feb. 12, there were 910 confirmed measles cases in the U.S., according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). That’s on pace to top last year’s 2,276 U.S. cases, which was the most since 1991. This year, 94% of the cases were among the unvaccinated or those with unknown vaccination status, CDC said. |
|
|
|
|
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said there is no plan to charge patent holders a percentage of their patent’s value, contrary to earlier reports, during a Feb. 10 exchange with Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE). “We will avoid harming innovation by not doing a valuation, or any valuation fee or tax on patents,” Lutnick said in an Appropriations Committee hearing. “That is not a thing the Patent Office is going to do, is try to say, ‘This patent is worth X.’ How in the world could we do that?” Sen. Coons expressed relief. Sen. Coons also praised Patent Trial and Appeals Board reforms from U.S. Patent and Trademark Office Director John Squires and urged Lutnick’s support for efforts to codify those reforms through the PREVAIL Act.
The House and Senate have the week off. |
|
|
|
|
|
