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Ahead of Senate Hearing, Doctors Decry 'Exorbitant' Cost of Ozempic and Wegovy
"Too often, because manufacturers are pricing out my patients, I have to resort to treatment options that are less effective and less safe," one doctor said.
Sep 16, 2024
As the U.S. Senate prepares for a hearing on Novo Nordisk overcharging Americans for Ozempic and Wegovy, Sen. Bernie Sanders on Monday released a letter from 253 health professionals asking Congress to take on the "exorbitant prices set by manufacturers" for non-insulin diabetes and weight loss medications.
The clinicians wrote that drugs including "semaglutide (marketed by Novo Nordisk as Ozempic for diabetes and Wegovy for weight loss) and... tirzapetide (marketed by Eli Lilly as Mounjaro for diabetes and Zepbound for weight loss) have been revolutionary in the management of chronic conditions of diabetes and obesity."
"However, even the most transformative medications cannot help our patients if they cannot afford them," states the letter, which is addressed to Sanders (I-Vt.), chair of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP), and Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.), the panel's ranking member.
"If Novo Nordisk does not end its greed and substantially reduce the price of these drugs, we must do everything we can to end it for them."
"Studies have shown that semaglutide can be manufactured for as little as nearly $5 per month, substantially lower than the current U.S. list price of $968 for Ozempic or $1,349 per month for Wegovy," the letter notes. "In contrast, Novo Nordisk has set the price of Wegovy at $92 in the United Kingdom and $186 in Denmark, clearly demonstrating that these drugs are being priced unfairly for our U.S. patients."
The health providers stressed that "for patients, these are not one-off prices they shoulder, but potentially lifelong costs they will need to consider. For obesity, the drugs work while patients take them, but once off treatment, studies have found that patients regain the weight."
"Patients in the U.S. face multiple hurdles in accessing the drugs, which we as prescribers do our best to help them navigate," they explained, detailing issues faced by people who have private insurance, Medicare and Medicaid coverage, and no insurance. "Lack of coverage, supply shortages, and the unreasonable sticker prices of these medications are pushing patients to consider alternative options, which are often unsafe."
"We want our patients to be able to access medications that can improve their health and quality of life, but we do not want to rob the American taxpayers to line the pockets of the pharmaceutical manufacturers," the clinicians concluded. "Senators, we are asking you to do everything in your power to bring down the price of these novel diabetes and obesity drugs. Our patients deserve to have the best options available to them at a fair price."
Echoing the letter in a Monday statement, Dr. Kasia Lipska, a practicing endocrinologist and diabetes researcher at the Yale School of Medicine in Connecticut, said that "the exorbitant prices that manufacturers are asking my patients to pay for these novel diabetes and obesity medications are simply unacceptable."
"Too often, because manufacturers are pricing out my patients, I have to resort to treatment options that are less effective and less safe," Lipska continued. "These are life-changing treatments that should be available to my patients and everyone who needs them, not just those who can afford to pay."
Dr. Elizabeth Dewey, another letter signatory who practices family medicine in Greensboro, North Carolina, said that in her state, "we have been struggling all year with lack of coverage for weight loss medications."
"When our state plan and large employers dropped coverage for weight loss medications earlier this year, patients were left without treatment," Dewey explained. "Those who wanted to continue on the medications could pay cash. But for most patients, paying hundreds of dollars without insurance coverage is not affordable. Even with drug company coupons or discounts on certain doses, these treatments are still unattainable for most of my patients."
Sanders, who launched a probe into Denmark-based Novo Nordisk back in April, welcomed the letter, saying that "doctors across this country are sick and tired of seeing their patients ripped off by giant pharmaceutical companies."
"There is no rational reason, other than greed, for Novo Nordisk to charge Americans with Type 2 diabetes $969 a month for Ozempic, while this same exact drug can be purchased for just $155 in Canada and just $59 in Germany," he argued. "Novo Nordisk also charges Americans with obesity $1,349 a month for Wegovy, while this same exact product can be purchased for just $140 in Germany."
"Doctors agree," he added. "If Novo Nordisk does not end its greed and substantially reduce the price of these drugs, we must do everything we can to end it for them."
The Senate HELP Committee hearing on Capitol Hill is scheduled for 10:00 am on Tuesday, September 24.
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'Corporate Greed': Biden, Sanders Tell Big Pharma to Stop 'Ripping Off' Americans
Past administrations "have been intimidated and deterred from challenging Big Pharma's monopoly power," an expert said. "Today, however, President Biden and Sen. Bernie Sanders call Big Pharma's bullying bluff."
Jul 02, 2024
President Joe Biden and Sen. Bernie Sanders on Tuesday called for prescription drug companies to lower prices and stop "ripping off" Americans.
The message from Biden and Sanders (I-Vt.) came in a joint op-ed in USA Today in which they laid out the reforms they've already pushed through, called out two pharmaceutical companies in particular for the "unconscionably" high prices they charge to Americans, and vowed to take governmental action to end the "corporate greed."
"There is no rational reason why Americans, for decades, have been forced to pay, by far, the highest prices in the world for the prescription drugs they need," Biden and Sanders wrote. "There is no rational reason why, for decades, 1 out of 4 Americans have been unable to afford the medicine their doctors prescribe.
"And it is most certainly not Americans' patriotic duty to pay high drug prices at home so others abroad can enjoy the fair prices that every American is entitled to," they added.
Consumer rights groups celebrated the strong position that the president and the senator took.
"For decades, presidential administrations on a bipartisan basis have been intimidated and deterred from challenging Big Pharma's monopoly power," Robert Weissman, president of Public Citizen, an advocacy group, said in a statement. "Today, however, President Biden and Sen. Bernie Sanders call Big Pharma's bullying bluff."
Pharmaceutical companies can make whatever excuses they want for their sky-high drug prices — we know it’s bullshit. And Biden and Bernie just called them on it.
If Big Pharma won’t quell its own greed, it’s up to the government to do it for them.https://t.co/YiodsDIoQI
— Public Citizen (@Public_Citizen) July 2, 2024
Some progress has been made on prescription drug prices in the last four years, Biden and Sanders noted in their op-ed.
The Inflation Reduction Act, which they helped enact, established a price ceiling of $35 per month for insulin for senior citizens. And, starting in 2025, no senior citizen will have to pay more than $2,000 in prescription drug prices in a given year—a reform Biden and Sanders said they'd like to see apply to all Americans. Medicare can now also negotiate with pharmaceutical companies to lower prices, as other countries do.
Yet the problem of high drug prices remains, and Sanders has made solving it a priority, focusing on it as chair of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee. Last year, he wrote an op-ed in Fox News, calling the opposition to pharmaceutical company profiteering an issue on which Americans of all political stripes "could not be more united." He also released a report showing that medications made using publicly funded research were then being priced exorbitantly by private firms.
The Vermont Independent has also repeatedly grilled pharmaceutical executives in hearings over the last two years, but they have generally not committed to lowering prices, though some companies did institute caps on out-of-pocket expenses on inhalers.
In April, Sanders and Biden teamed up for an event at the White House to discuss the need to lower prescription drug prices.
"I'm proud that my administration is taking on Big Pharma in the most significant ways ever," Biden said at the event. "And I wouldn't have done it without Bernie... Bernie was the one who was leading the way for decades."
Tuesday's op-ed marks the continuation of their partnership on the issue, with Biden effectively endorsing Sanders' drug pricing agenda, particularly for obesity and diabetes medications. HELP launched an investigation into Novo Nordisk's pricing of Ozempic and Wegovy in April, and the Danish multinational was the primary example of wrongdoing chosen by Biden and Sanders in their op-ed.
Ozempic and Wegovy are up to six times more expensive in the U.S. than in peer countries, Biden and Sanders wrote.
"In 2023, for example, Novo Nordisk made over $12 billion in profits, in part by charging Americans over $1,000 a month for a prescription drug that can be profitably manufactured for less than $5. That is not making a reasonable return on investment. That is price gouging. That is corporate greed."
Sanders recently succeeded in pressuring Novo Nordisk CEO Lars Fruergaard Jørgensen to agree to testify in front of HELP in September.
Biden and Sanders noted that even just within obesity and diabetes care, the problem goes beyond Novo Nordisk: Eli Lilly's Mounjaro, a comparable weight-loss drug, is also overpriced. They argued that if the prices of such drugs are not lowered, they could bankrupt the U.S. healthcare system.
Biden then repeated the message through his own channels.
"If Big Pharma refuses to lower prescription drug prices and end their greed, we will do everything within our power to end it for them," Biden wrote on social media following the publication of the op-ed. "Bernie Sanders and I will not rest until every American can afford the prescriptions they need to lead healthy, happy, and productive lives."
Though the timing may be incidental, Biden's cooperation with Sanders, a leading progressive, comes during a week in which he needs to rally his base—a task Sanders is known to excel at. Biden faces widespread pressure to step aside from the presidential race following a subpar debate performance on Thursday night.
While progressives have been sharply critical of Biden on a range of issues, it's not clear whether his potential replacements at the top of the Democratic ticket would be so willing to team up with Sanders and call out corporate greed.
"Bernie Sanders and Joe Biden just co-authored a piece laying into big pharmaceutical companies for overcharging Americans on obesity drugs," Matt Stoller, a progressive commentator and research director of the American Economic Liberties Project, wrote on social media. "I realize Biden is senile, but would his replacements do anything like this? Most wouldn't."
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Nearly Half of US Nutrition Board Members Have Food and Pharma Industry Ties: Report
"Millions of Americans' lives are affected by this report and it's crucial that the report tell the truth to American people and it's not degraded into another sales pitch for Big Food and Big Pharma."
Oct 06, 2023
Nearly half the members of the U.S. government panel that helps draft dietary guidelines for Americans have ties to the food, pharmaceutical, or weight loss industry, a report released this week revealed.
"Food and pharmaceutical industry actors have historically sought to influence the U.S. Dietary Guidelines for Americans (DGA), and have had financial ties to nutrition experts on the Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee (DGAC), which reviews the latest science on diet, nutrition, and health outcomes to make recommendations for the DGA," states the report, which was authored by researchers at the advocacy group U.S. Right to Know.
"We found that 13 of 20 DGAC members had high-risk, medium-risk, or possible conflicts of interest with industry actors," the authors wrote.
Of these, nine were high- or medium-risk conflicts with companies and industry groups including Coca-Cola, the Nestlé Nutrition Institute, National Dairy Council, Weight Watchers International, Beyond Meat, the California Walnut Commission, and the National Egg Board. Big Pharma giants including Pfizer, Abbott, Novo Nordisk, and Eli Lilly are also named in the report.
U.S. Right to Know executive director Gary Ruskin toldThe Guardian that revelations like those in the report erode consumer confidence in government dietary guidelines.
"Millions of Americans' lives are affected by this report and it's crucial that the report tell the truth to American people and it's not degraded into another sales pitch for Big Food and Big Pharma," Ruskin said.
The report also notes some "encouraging findings," including that "seven members had no relationships in the past five years that met our definition" of conflicts of interest, and that "four members only had one instance" of possible conflicts.
"Surely, there is room for further improvement," the publication states. "With high-risk conflicts of interest still present on the DGAC,
the public cannot have confidence that the official dietary advice of the U.S. government is free from industry influence."
The report's authors offer recommendations for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and U.S. Department of Agriculture, including:
- Not appointing DGAC members with high-risk conflicts of interest;
- Disclosing individual members' conflicts during the last five years;
- Using a better disclosure form;
- Publishing a list of provisional appointees prior to appointment, open for public comment; and
- Including leadership roles or paid roles at conflicted nutrition organizations in disclosures of potential conflicts of interest.
The group also called on Congress to expand the Physician Payments Sunshine Act to cover the nutrition field.
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