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Talking drug prices with President Barack Obama was just the start. Merck & Co.’s chief executive officer says he’s on a campaign to change a perception most Americans have: that pharmaceutical companies charge too much for their drugs. Ken Frazier has been roaming the halls of Washington, a short trip from Merck headquarters in New Jersey, to make the case that the drug industry relies on a few precious years of high prices to fund research before its medications lose their patents. (Koons, 10/30)

There is a new price surge in the pharmaceutical industry—not for medications, instead for a limited number of government-issued vouchers that drug makers, including AbbVie Inc. and Sanofi SA, are buying to speed products to market. Legal provisions enacted in 2007 and 2012 require the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to issue “priority review vouchers” as rewards to developers of drugs for rare pediatric conditions or tropical diseases, such as malaria. Congress intended the vouchers to encourage more research into underfunded diseases. Companies receive them when the FDA approves their drug for sale and can redeem them to speed FDA consideration of a subsequent drug for any disease. (Loftus, 11/1)

After seeing its stock price soar, Valeant Pharmaceuticals of Canada is now under pressure and its shares are down more than 60 percent. Several hedge funds that are principal investors in the high-flying, high-profit company, are fiercely defending it against allegations of improper business and accounting practices. (Hartman, 10/30)

CVS Health Corp (CVS.N) gave a disappointing profit forecast for 2016, hurt by costs related to the acquisition of Target Corp's pharmacies and as its own pharmacy benefits management business expands in low-margin Medicare and Medicaid plans. The drugstore operator's profit missed analysts' estimates for the first time in six quarters, as its $10-billion Omnicare acquisition failed to offset pressure from lower reimbursement rates and new low-margin generic drugs. (Ramakrishnan, 10/30)