Print“Sovaldi is the canary in the coal-mine, alerting all of us that disaster is coming unless something is done to prevent it, says John Rother, CEO of NCHC.”
Adding its voice to a growing chorus demanding reasons for the high cost of specialty drugs, the National Coalition on Health Care, or NCHC, has launched the “Campaign for Sustainable Rx Pricing” to spotlight what the group characterizes as “unsustainable and abusive” prices for some medicines.
“Our health care system cannot sustain these continued escalating drug prices,” says Jack Lewin, chairman of NCHC and former CEO of the California Medical Association and the American College of Cardiology. “Stakeholders across the health care system need to work together to solve this problem—and pharmaceutical companies are going to have to come to the table and be part of the solution.”
The NCHC includes medical societies, labor unions, insurance companies and patient advocacy groups, many of which voiced concern over the strain of excessive drug prices. The new NCHC campaign hopes to spark a national dialogue about the need to find market-based solutions to the problems caused by the onslaught of new high-priced prescription medicines. Led by John Rother, NCHC president and CEO, the campaign will sponsor, research, events and policy discussions to inform key stakeholders.
Rother singles out Sovaldi, Gilead Pharmaceuticals’ hepatitis C drug that is priced at $84,000 for a 12-week course of treatment, or $1,000 per pill. It has caught the attention of payers partly because the patient population eligible to take the drug numbers in the millions, rather than in the thousands. But it has also drawn ire from patient advocacy groups, public health officials, and others.
“Sovaldi is the canary in the coal-mine, alerting all of us that disaster is coming unless something is done to prevent it,” says Rother, whose group includes more than 80 organizations, representing employers, purchasers, providers, and consumers. “Unfortunately, the problem is far bigger than one drug—we are talking about a tsunami of expensive medicines that could literally bankrupt the health care system.”
Rother lauds new drug innovation and the benefits to patients of many new drugs coming on the market. He says his group wants to protect and encourage future innovation, but if healthcare systems can’t afford it, it isn’t sustainable. “Sovaldi looks very much like an abuse of market power and we are going to shine a light on it and see what happens,” he says.
AARP, which represents more than 37 million consumers over 50 years of age supports NCHC’s efforts and has reinforced the coalition’s concerns. “The debate surrounding the introduction of Sovaldi is part of a much larger issue: escalating specialty drug prices that will impact everyone in the health care system, regardless of whether they are taking one themselves, through increased premiums and cost sharing,” says Debra Whitman, AARP’s executive vice president for policy, strategy and international affairs.
Dealing with the issue of higher cost drugs, especially “specialty drugs,” will only become more critical in the coming years. One estimate is that by 2020, spending on specialty drugs will quadruple from $87 billion to more than $400 billion. Payers say this rapid growth in spending will put significant upward pressure on premiums in both the private marketplace as well as in public programs like Medicare.
“The pricing of new, specialty drugs poses serious challenges to those who pay for health care, and Sovaldi is just the first of many similar drugs that are in the pipeline, says David Lansky, president and CEO of the Pacific Business Group on Health. “Stakeholders will need to work together and develop new approaches for drug approvals, treatment indications, and financing to ensure that all patients who need these emerging treatments can afford and benefit from them.”
May 31, 2014
http://www.burrillreport.com/article-coalition_launches_campaign_to_foster_dialogue_on_drug_pricing.html
