Report Finds Several Brand Name Drug Companies Waiting to Introduce New Products Until They Can Get Approval for More Lucrative Disease Classes
It appears egregious price hikes on existing prescription drugs, out-of-control prices on new products and anti-competitive schemes to extend monopolies just aren’t enough to satisfy Big Pharma’s appetite for putting profits over patients. A new report finds Big Pharma companies are increasingly delaying bringing new medications to market that could help patients to hold for additional approvals for more lucrative disease classes or indications to maximize their profitability.
“Firms that normally try to sell drugs as soon as possible are suspending clinical trials and shifting timelines,” Bloomberg reports, “They’re moving to maximize drugs’ revenue potential, even if it means patients will have to wait longer for new therapies.”
As an example, the report states how brand name drug maker Roche is considering putting off approval for a drug that would treat ovarian cancer, which affects approximately 20,000 Americans annually, while the drug maker pursues approval for the drug to treat prostate cancer, which affects almost 300,000 Americans per year.
As Leigh Purvis, prescription drug policy director at AARP noted, this is “reprehensible” behavior from the pharmaceutical industry, as these companies are essentially saying, “We have this product that helps patients but we’re choosing not to bring it to market because our bottom line matters more.”
In July, The New York Times documented a particularly egregious case of Big Pharma delaying the introduction of an updated HIV treatment with better clinical value for patients in order to maximize profits on the patent life of the original drug. The anti-competitive strategy from the drug manufacturer, Gilead, blocked access to a treatment with less harmful side effects for ten years — in order to extend and maximize the Big Pharma company’s monopoly over its HIV treatments.
Read the full report from Bloomberg HERE.
Read more about how Big Pharma’s R&D investments discredit the industry’s doom and gloom innovation rhetoric HERE.
Read about how Big Pharma’s bogus R&D scare tactics are the exact opposite of what they’re telling investors HERE.
And learn more about market-based solutions to hold Big Pharma accountable and lower prescription drug prices HERE.