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Nine years ago, Jimmy Carter held a news conference at the Carter Center in Atlanta to talk about his cancer diagnosis and treatment. ... If his diagnosis had come a few years earlier he would have been given about six months to live. Instead, on Tuesday, the former president will celebrate his 100th birthday. Luck played a role, of course. But there's no question, experts say, that he's alive today because of the immune therapy he received. (Weintraub, 9/30)

Advocates for lower drug prices say a federal lawsuit filed this month against St Louis-based Express Scripts and two other companies could result in more affordable medicine for patients. The Federal Trade Commission on Sept. 20 filed an administrative complaint against the pharmacy benefit manager, alleging it and two other companies, OptumRx and Caremark, have artificially inflated insulin prices at the expense of patients. (Fentem, 9/30)

Drug middlemen are duking it out to buy their customers. Most Americans pick up their prescription drugs at the local pharmacy, but many pricey medications are bought directly by medical providers. Think, for example, of a chemotherapy infusion delivered at a doctor’s office. The intermediaries selling drugs to those doctors run a pretty good business. Now, the big three U.S. drug wholesalers—McKesson, Cencora and Cardinal Health —are taking control of the doctors, too, to lock them in as customers. (Wainer, 9/27)

A major hedge-fund investor will meet top executives of CVS Health on Monday to propose ways the struggling healthcare company can improve its operations, the potential start of an activist stance by the fund, according to people close to the matter. The slated meeting, between CVS and hedge fund Glenview Capital Management, comes amid signs investors are turning restless with a company that remains among the best-recognized in the healthcare industry but has seen its shares tumble 24% this year to date. (Zuckerman and Mathews, 9/29)

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved Sanofi and Regeneron's blockbuster drug Dupixent for patients with a chronic lung disease, commonly known as "smoker's lung", the companies said on Friday. (Roy, 9/27)