DOSE OF REALITY: GSK’S BRAND NAME INHALER BAIT-AND-SWITCH INCREASED COSTS AND WORSENED HEALTH OUTCOMES

New Report Details Impact of Big Pharma Giant’s Strategy to Maintain Monopoly Pricing Power and Sidestep Accountability for Years of Price Hikes

In case you missed it, a new report from U.S. Senate Committee on Finance Subcommittee on Health Care Ranking Member Maggie Hassan (D-NH) highlights how Big Pharma giant, GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) executed an egregious strategy to keep prices high on its widely used asthma inhaler, Flovent. GSK’s scheme, designed specifically to keep prices high, triggered higher costs, coverage disruptions, and worse outcomes for patients, according to the report. The report arrives just two weeks after the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the first conventional generic version of Flovent HFA.

GSK’s 2024 action involved suddenly discontinuing its brand-name inhaler and trying to shift patients to an identical product under a different “authorized generic” label, sidestepping accountability for years of price hikes while maintaining control over pricing. Part of the reason for GSK’s move was policy about to take effect as part of the American Rescue Plan Act, which lifted the cap on Medicaid rebates for drugs that outpace inflation — a move that would have cost GSK an estimated $368 million annually. Rather than comply, GSK pulled a bait and switch by discontinuing the product on January 1, 2024, the same day the rebate cap took effect.

By doing so, GSK preserved its monopoly pricing power over the authorized generic version of the product while end-running policies designed to discourage drug price increases that outpace inflation — underscoring how far Big Pharma will go to protect profits and high prices at the expense of patients.

The Senate Finance minority report makes clear just how harmful this strategy has been for patients and families — particularly since the change took place rapidly, without warning or adequate time for patients or health plans to adapt to the sudden elimination of such a widely prescribed brand name medication from the market. As a result of GSK’s Flovent strategy 78 percent of parents reported their child had to switch medications, costs were higher for nearly a third of patients, and nearly 20 percent of children experienced worsening day-to-day symptoms, including nine percent who experienced a more severe asthma flare-up.

The scheme seemed to work well for GSK. The brand name drug manufacturer reported fourth quarter earnings in February that exceeded Wall Street analysts’ expectations, driving its stock price to a 26-year high. Over the past four quarters, GSK has consistently outperformed earnings estimates, fueled in part by $11.46 billion in Q4 sales, $44.75 billion in full-year 2025 revenue.

“GSK has a had a stranglehold on this set of products for three decades and we only start seeing price-lowering effects when we have multiple generics on the market,” said William Feldman, director of the Pharmaceutical Policy and Outcomes Lab at The University of California Los Angeles (UCLA), in reporting from STAT News.

This latest evidence adds to a well-documented reality that Big Pharma continues to game the system to maintain monopoly pricing power and keep drug prices high. Whether through this bait-and-switch tactic, patent thickets, or other anti-competitive tactics designed to extend monopolies, brand name drug companies are blocking competition from more affordable generics and biosimilars — leaving patients and taxpayers to pay the price.

Read more on bipartisan, market-based solutions to hold Big Pharma accountable HERE.

Read more on how Big Pharma games the system to block competition and keep drug prices high HERE.