Unbiased Analysis of Today's Healthcare Issues
Many people don’t understand why pharmaceuticals cost so much money. Don’t pharmaceutical companies make a lot of money? The answer is ‘yes’, but only if the drugs are successful. A paper by Wouters et al. (2024) found that: Based on data for 361 of 558 new therapeutic agents approved over the study period (median follow-up…
From an interesting review paper in the Journal of Economic Perspectives by Craig Garthwaite: Although research and development investments clearly respond to market opportunities, the exact benefits created by these incremental investments remain unclear. This is largely because the exact marginal products developed in response to these incentives are elusive to identify. Certainly, the amount…
That is the topic from my article out today at The Evidence Base. An excerpt is below: On May 12, 2025, President Trump issued an executive order calling for “most favored nation” (MFN) drug pricing in the US. Key questions you may have include: ▪ What is MFN pricing? ▪ Which countries will be included in…
That is the topic of a JMCP Viewpoint by Sean Sullivan, Jens Grueger, Aidan Sullivan, and Scott Ramsey. Some excerpts: The Budget Lab at Yale University projected that a 25% ad valorem tariff would increase medication costs by an “average of around $600 per year per household in the United States.”3 Tariffs can also create supply…
There were lots of very interesting sessions at ISPOR 2025 in Montreal. One of my favorites that I was able to attend was titled “Medicare Price Negotiation of Part B Drugs: Implications for Provider Reimbursement and Commercial Spillover“. The session was moderated by Sean Sullivan of University of Washington, with Kristi Martin from the Centers…
Typically, cost effectiveness analyses assume a constant price between drug approvals and loss of exclusivity. It is not clear, however, to what extent that assumption is valid, particularly after taking into account drug price discounts and rebates. A paper by Lin et al. (2024) uses 2007-2023 data on drug prices from SSR Health to answer…
Perhaps so according to Politico: Trump early next week is expected to sign an executive order directing aides to pursue the initiative, called “most favored nation,” for a selection of drugs within the Medicare program. The idea would use the administration’s authorities to force prices down… White House officials initially pressed congressional Republicans to draft…
It seems like the answer is now ‘yes’. EndPoints reports: Stealth BioTherapeutics said the FDA would not meet its Tuesday deadline for approving or rejecting the company’s drug, elamipretide. It had been seeking regulatory clearance of elamipretide for a rare disease called Barth syndrome, which affects only about 150 people in the US and causes…
Perhaps this is what President Trump is exploring. Reuters reports: Drugmakers have been warned that the Trump Administration is considering linking U.S. medicine prices to lower amounts paid by other developed countries, according to two company sources who called the option the pharmaceutical industry’s top concern.Both sources, who were not authorized to speak publicly, said…
At least according to CEOs from Novartis, Sanofi and AstraZeneca. Reuters reports: European drugmakers are urging the EU to allow higher medicine prices, warning that without stronger investment incentives, the bloc would fall further behind the U.S., where tariff threats have triggered a wave of pharma investment announcements. AstraZeneca Chief Executive Officer Pascal Soriot said…