�鶹Ů��

Members of Congress on Wednesday pelted the chief executive of Mylan, the company behind the EpiPen, the treatment for severe allergy attacks, with questions about steep price increases on the product and accused her of turning her back on families that could no longer afford the lifesaving treatment. The chief executive, Heather Bresch, was the latest in a string of drug company leaders to be interrogated by the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform as public outrage has grown over the rising cost of drugs. (Thomas, 9/21)

The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform called Bresch to testify in the wake of public outrage over EpiPen, whose list price has risen to $600 for a pair of the devices compared with $100 in 2007. Lawmakers in turn described the actions as "sickening," "disgusting" and showing "blatant disrespect" for American families who can no longer afford the life-saving device for children susceptible to severe allergic reactions. (Humer, 9/21)

Mylan CEO Heather Bresch infuriated lawmakers as she tried — and mostly failed — to explain steep cost increases of her company's life-saving EpiPens. ... In almost four hours of questioning, the soft-spoken CEO at times seemed unsure, or declined to answer directly, when asked questions about the company's finances and profits, angering lawmakers. (Jalonick, 9/22)

Bresch’s compensation was an issue for lawmakers as well, as it often is when CEOs appear before lawmakers. When asked about her pay, Bresch briefly stuttered before saying, “It’s in the middle” compared to others in the industry. Bresch was awarded $19.4 million in pay last year, which made her the 25th-best paid executive in the health-care industry, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Her response generated more outrage from lawmakers. (Edney and Langreth, 9/21)

Proposed solutions included finding ways for the Food and Drug Administration to ease the drug-approval process so competition can help bring down prices and calls for greater transparency in pharmaceutical pricing. But Heather Bresch, Mylan's chief executive, stayed firm in her message that the list price of EpiPen had increased because of the inherent complexity of the pharmaceutical marketplace and that few patients were paying the list price. She has attempted to shift blame away from her company to a network of middlemen that sits between drug companies and patients and take a cut of the price. Bresch said that Mylan's efforts to cut down the price patients pay - including its plan to release a half-price generic version of EpiPen - would solve the problem. (Johnson, 9/21)

“We believe it was a fair price, and we now just lowered it by half,” Ms. Bresch said. Her remarks triggered criticism from Oversight and Government Reform Committee members from both parties. Several accused Mylan during the first hours of the hearing of profiting excessively from a relatively inexpensive drug that patients’ lives depend on. “I am a very conservative and pro-business Republican, but I am sickened by what I’ve heard,” Rep. John Duncan (R., Tenn.) said. (Rockoff, Radnofsky and Hernandez, 9/22)

“The greed is astounding; it’s sickening and disgusting,” said Rep. John Duncan, R-Tenn. Rep. Elijah Cumming of Maryland, the ranking Democrat on the committee, said Mylan “jacked up” the price of the life-saving product “to get filthy rich at the expense of our constituents.” He accused the company of using a “simple but corrupt business model” to enrich themselves in the same manner as Martin Shkreli of Turing and executives at Valeant Pharmaceuticals, who drew public criticism for huge price increases for drugs their companies made. (Radelat, 9/21)

She said most patients at risk of an allergic reaction now have access to the drug, and that 85% of patients pay less than $100 for a two-unit package. “Looking back, I wish we had better anticipated the magnitude and acceleration of the rising financial issues for a growing minority of patients who may have ended up paying the full … price or more,” she said. “We never intended this.” Bresch said the company was making far less on the drug than the public believed. She said after rebates and fees Mylan received just $274 of the device’s $608 wholesale price. (Petersen, 9/21)

While the company apparently is looking to use the analysis to downplay its profits, analysts say the margin is still quite high. Ronny Gal, a pharmaceutical industry analyst at the investment firm Sanford Bernstein, says Bresch's numbers mean Mylan makes a 40 percent profit margin on the device. (Kodjak, 9/21)

In a particularly tense exchange, Rep. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.) questioned Bresch about a report by USA Today this week that said her mother had misused her clout on a school board to help boost EpiPen sales. “Your own mother is lobbying to make sure they’re in your schools,” Duckworth, who is running for Senate this fall, shouted, holding up a copy of the newspaper. Bresch interrupted: “I’m sorry, Congressman. That is completely inaccurate.” Earlier in the hearing, Bresch had strongly denied the report detailing a concerted effort by Gayle Manchin — Bresch's mother, the Democratic senator’s wife and the then-president of the National Association of State Boards of Education — to push state lawmakers to support legislation mandating school systems to buy anti-allergy devices, such as EpiPens, back in 2012. (Ferris, 9/21)

Even as the cost of EpiPens dramatically rose, so too did the number of prescriptions written for patients in Medicare, sending spending by the program skyrocketing nearly 1,100 percent from 2007 to 2014, a new report shows. During the same period, the total number of Medicare beneficiaries using EpiPens climbed 164 percent, from nearly 80,000 users in 2007 to more than 211,000 in 2014, according to the analysis by the Kaiser Family Foundation. While the report does not delve into what’s behind the increase, factors could include increased awareness among people with allergies, marketing efforts and access to insurance coverage. (Appleby and Carey, 9/21)

Medicare’s prescription drug program increased spending on EpiPens from $7 million in 2007 to $87.9 million in 2014, an increase of 1,151 percent, according to a new Kaiser Family Foundation brief. Average spending per EpiPen prescription increased from $71 in 2007 to $344 in 2014. EpiPens come in a pack of two and must be replaced every 12 to 18 months. While the number of Medicare Part D enrollees using EpiPens also increased during the seven-year period that Kaiser examined, that increase (164 percent) was significantly lower than the increase in total spending on EpiPens. (Owens, 9/20)

Mylan is just the most recent pharmaceutical company to spark a nationwide uproar over excessive drug pricing. These companies have either jacked up the retail list price of drugs that have long been on the market after acquiring their patents, which is what Mylan did with EpiPen, or have imposed sky-high prices on newly developed, highly-effective drugs such as Gilead Sciences’ hepatitis-C drugs Sovaldi and Harvoni, which retail for roughly $1,000 per pill, or $84,000 for a course of treatment. Expensive drugs have greatly added to the overall annual cost of U.S. health care and are posing serious economic consequences for consumers, health insurers and federal government agencies and programs. (Pianin, 9/21)

The EpiPen, the potentially life-saving device that delivers a dose of medicine to people having a severe allergic reaction, has been all over the news for its outrageous price spike. Going up 500 percent in just under a decade is upsetting. But even as the company and regulators are dealing with its price, going unaddressed is the product’s significant design flaw. (Groeger, 9/21)