Big Pharma Maintains Business-as-Usual Approach to Price-Gouging Americans to Start the New Year
Washington, D.C. – The Campaign for Sustainable Rx Pricing (CSRxP) released a statement today on reports that brand name drug companies plan to hike prices on at least 500 prescription drugs to start the year, as part of the pharmaceutical industry’s traditional biennial rounds of price hikes, in January and July.
“Big Pharma ringing in the new year with yet another round of egregious price hikes on hundreds of brand name prescription drugs demonstrates the pharmaceutical industry will maintain its business-as-usual approach to price-gouging Americans in 2024,” said CSRxP executive director Lauren Aronson. “As Congress reconvenes this month, lawmakers must take note of Big Pharma’s continued commitment to putting profits over people through egregious pricing and anti-competitive practices and focus on holding brand name drug companies accountable to lower drug prices.”
Last year in January, the pharmaceutical industry raised prices on 587 brand name drugs by an average of 5.5 percent. In July, Big Pharma increased prices on more than 100 prescription drugs. Many of Big Pharma’s price hikes continue to outpace inflation. In December, the Biden Administration announced that Big Pharma increased prices faster than the rate of inflation on 48 Medicare Part B drugs in the last quarter of 2023. A fact sheet released by the White House noted more than 750,000 American seniors rely on the prescription drugs, covered by Medicare Part B, that Big Pharma hit with price hikes outpacing inflation in the quarter.
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