Why Did Mylan Hike EpiPen Prices 400%? Because They Could

[thackney]

I suspect this has something to do with it:

I do know that I have to replace my son's four Epi-Pens in about two weeks, and I will be asking the pediatrician about using a less expensive option.

Thank you for the information.  Keep us posted in what you learn.  My mom also keeps Epi-Pens.  Many of the seniors she knows that need them buy the two pack and split it with another, keeping only one Pen.

[thackney]

Mylan expands EpiPen cost-cutting programs after charges of price gouging
http://www.cnbc.com/2016/08/25/mylan-expands-epipen-cost-cutting-programs-after-charges-of-price-gouging.html
8/25/2016

Mylan on Thursday announced plans to boost access to its EpiPen Auto-Injector by expanding already existing programs for patients who are facing higher out-of-pocket costs.

The price of the EpiPen, a life-saving medication and delivery system for people with severe allergies, has increased more than 400 percent in the past decade.

Shares of Mylan rose more than 3 percent in premarket trading Thursday following the announcement. (Get the latest quote here.) With the company under pressure from members of Congress and Democratic presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton, the stock lost 5.4 percent of its value on Wednesday.

The company is reducing the cost of EpiPens through the use of a savings card that will cover up to $300 for the EpiPen 2-Pak.

excerpted

[mystery-ak]

News
Company that price gouged EpiPen is Clinton Foundation donor

By Daniel Halper

August 25, 2016 | 7:54am

The pharmaceutical company under fire for increasing the cost of its life-saving EpiPen has been criticized by Hillary Clinton — despite the fact that the manufacturer donated to the Clinton Foundation.

Records available on the website of the Bill, Hillary and Chelsea Clinton Foundation reveal Mylan, the company that manufactures the EpiPen, has donated up to $250,000.

On Wednesday, Clinton released a statement blasting her family foundation’s donor.

more
http://nypost.com/2016/08/25/company-that-price-gouged-epipen-is-clinton-foundation-donor/

[mountaineer]

Mylan's CEO is Heather Bresch, the daughter of Democrat U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin of W.Va. She is infamous for having received an MBA from West Virginia University when she never attended a single class at the business school. Daddy made all the arrangements for her. You may recall that Manchin used to be almost conservative, but when he got in the Senate, he wanted desperately to be Hillary's running mate in 2008 so he veered left and never looked back. He's now in lockstep with the DNC on gun rights and just about every other item of the platform.

[Charlespg]

Maybe if we actually started enforcing Anti-Trust Laws again.

Ditto  and an excessive profits tax when companies and Ceo's  mark up life saving medicine  over 100 percent ..There is a reason I don't support unrestrained capitalism any more then I do socialism and this a good example

[thackney]

Ditto  and an excessive profits tax when companies and Ceo's  mark up life saving medicine  over 100 percent ..There is a reason I don't support unrestrained capitalism any more then I do socialism and this a good example

How do you fit in the generic version available with that thought?

[Weird Tolkienish Figure]

You shouldn't need a prescription to buy Epi-Pens or any medication for that matter.

There are failures of capitalism out there but this is not a failure of capitalism.

[thackney]

You shouldn't need a prescription to buy Epi-Pens or any medication for that matter.

There are failures of capitalism out there but this is not a failure of capitalism.

Agreed.  Especially a product like this where the user decides when to use it.

This is a government created problem.  More government regulation is not a solution.

[dfwgator]

Ditto  and an excessive profits tax when companies and Ceo's  mark up life saving medicine  over 100 percent ..There is a reason I don't support unrestrained capitalism any more then I do socialism and this a good example

Ensure a competitive marketplace and an excess profits tax is unnecessary.

[Weird Tolkienish Figure]

The prescription system is totally unneeded IMO. No you shouldn't figure this stuff out all on your own, the doctor would write up a recommendation, you could give the recommendation to the pharmacy, they could direct you to the appropriate medication.

[mirraflake]

Ensure a competitive marketplace and an excess profits tax is unnecessary.

I am  in the health biz -30+ years

So much misinformation from conservatives/head in the sand regarding medical drugs. One thing that frost me with the right.. Companies are always right, gov't always wrong.

R/X companies impose  their own prices and controls.

Generic drugs  for instance have skyrocketed in price last 2-3 years due to drug companies buying up their competition, stopping the manufacturing of those drugs and then raising the price of theirs because they no longer have competition.

Generics have gone from in many cases from $10 to $35-40  just in the last few years. Gov't is not forcing them to do this..They are doing it to raise prices and because they can.

Get some education and stop blaming gov't for all this crap.

[mirraflake]

The prescription system is totally unneeded IMO. No you shouldn't figure this stuff out all on your own, the doctor would write up a recommendation, you could give the recommendation to the pharmacy, they could direct you to the appropriate medication.

Soooo. your doctor knows why he/she is recommending a certain med due to known side effects or has inside information on your health history because tada he is your doctor but you will give the decision to make decision on your drugs to your pharmacist who is not a doctor and has not seen your medical chart /test?

No thanks.

@Weird Tolkienish Figure

[dfwgator]

I am  in the health biz -30+ years

So much misinformation from conservatives/head in the sand regarding medical drugs. One thing that frost me with the right.. Companies are always right, gov't always wrong.

R/X companies impose  their own prices and controls.

Generic drugs  for instance have skyrocketed in price last 2-3 years due to drug companies buying up their competition, stopping the manufacturing of those drugs and then raising the price of theirs because they no longer have competition.

Generics have gone from in many cases from $10 to $35-40  just in the last few years. Gov't is not forcing them to do this..They are doing it to raise prices and because they can.

Get some education and stop blaming gov't for all this crap.

I am blaming the government for not enforcing the Anti-Trust Laws. 

[Weird Tolkienish Figure]

Soooo. your doctor knows why he/she is recommending a certain med due to known side effects or has inside information on your health history because tada he is your doctor but you will give the decision to make decision on your drugs to your pharmacist who is not a doctor and has not seen your medical chart /test?

No thanks.

@Weird Tolkienish Figure

Thanks for not understanding what I wrote, whatsoever. My proposal was simply to do what they do now, minus the legal compulsion.

Put power in the hands of consumers, not in the system.

[Weird Tolkienish Figure]

I am  in the health biz -30+ years

So much misinformation from conservatives/head in the sand regarding medical drugs. One thing that frost me with the right.. Companies are always right, gov't always wrong.

R/X companies impose  their own prices and controls.

Generic drugs  for instance have skyrocketed in price last 2-3 years due to drug companies buying up their competition, stopping the manufacturing of those drugs and then raising the price of theirs because they no longer have competition.

Generics have gone from in many cases from $10 to $35-40  just in the last few years. Gov't is not forcing them to do this..They are doing it to raise prices and because they can.

Get some education and stop blaming gov't for all this crap.

That is technically illegal and anti-competitive. We don't need more laws, we need to enforce the ones we have.

[mountaineer]

Check out the CEO's Daddy.  Then you will know why the pens are so expensive.  ;)

Exactly. Joe Manchin is of below-average intelligence, drinks too much and is as dishonest as any other Democrat you'll ever meet. He pulled strings for his little girl to get an MBA without ever attending classes, and you can bet he'd do whatever she asked when it came to the FDA or any other government regulations involving a Mylan product.

[The_Reader_David]

... it's a natural monopoly based on the government-sanctioned patent...

Um, no.  A patent is not a natural monopoly.  It is a government-granted monopoly. 

[The_Reader_David]

Maybe if we actually started enforcing Anti-Trust Laws again.

I'm not sure this is a matter of lack of Anti-Trust enforcement.  We regulate prices of natural monopolies (utilities) which deliver goods and services for which demand is inelastic (e.g. water, electricity) , but don't do the same for government-granted monopolies (patents) which deliver goods and services for which demand is inelastic (e.g life-saving drugs) on the plea that such regulation would interfere with the "free market".  An absurd claim since the grant of a monopoly means there is not a free market in operation.

[Polly Ticks]

Thank you for the information.  Keep us posted in what you learn.  My mom also keeps Epi-Pens.  Many of the seniors she knows that need them buy the two pack and split it with another, keeping only one Pen.

Update for @Wingnut  and  @thackney  :

Sorry guys, I punted.  We went to the doctor yesterday and he gave us a $0 copay coupon for the EpiPens, so we went ahead and got those again.  They are for my youngest son, so I didn't really want to muddy the waters with a new delivery device that works differently until I am forced to do so by economics.

[thackney]

For $0 I would do the same.

God Bless

[Wingnut]

Update for @Wingnut  and  @thackney  :

Sorry guys, I punted.  We went to the doctor yesterday and he gave us a $0 copay coupon for the EpiPens, so we went ahead and got those again.  They are for my youngest son, so I didn't really want to muddy the waters with a new delivery device that works differently until I am forced to do so by economics.

Thanks for the info.  I'll have the Mrs ask the doc for one of those zero copay thingies.

[Polly Ticks]

Thanks for the info.  I'll have the Mrs ask the doc for one of those zero copay thingies.

Yep, those are very handy.

As an aside, the retail price on my receipt was $729.99 per 2-pack.

[mountaineer]

As an aside, the retail price on my receipt was $729.99 per 2-pack.

[Polly Ticks]

Couldn't have said it better.

[mountaineer]

Report: EpiPen profits 60% more than Bresch told Congress
W.Va. Gazette-Mail
Sept. 26, 2016

Lawmakers were skeptical last week when Mylan chief executive Heather Bresch told them the company made only $100 in profit for a two-pack of EpiPens.

During a House hearing, Bresch repeatedly referred to a poster board showing how little of the $608 list price trickled back to the company.

The incredulity was warranted: The profits Bresch told Congress about were calculated after factoring in the 37.5 percent U.S. tax rate, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission first reported by The Wall Street Journal. That tax rate is more than five times the overall tax rate the company actually paid last year and much higher than its actual U.S. tax rate, which tax specialists have pegged at close to zero.

Before taxes, the EpiPen profit is actually $160 for a two-pack. At the hearing, Bresch said the company sold about 4 million two-packs a year.

“It is intellectually dishonest to include tax provisions for U.S. taxes that aren’t due, and that the company does not, in fact, anticipate ever having to pay,” said Edward Kleinbard, a professor of law and business at the University of Southern California’s Gould School of Law.

As The Washington Post has reported, Mylan has reduced its effective tax rate through an inversion by relocating its headquarters to the Netherlands. The company’s overall tax rate is well below the U.S. tax rate, at 7 percent in 2015, according to the SEC filing. But the taxes the company pays in the United States have been pushed down even further.

Mylan’s U.S. tax rate “is close to zero, a very, very low rate,” Robert Willens, an independent tax expert, said.

Mylan defended the way it reported its profits.

“Tax is typically included in a standard profitability analysis, and the information provided to Congress has made clear that tax was part of the EpiPen Auto-Injector profitability analysis,” Mylan spokeswoman Nina Devlin said in a statement. “It also is important to note that use of a statutory tax rate for the jurisdiction being analyzed (in this instance, the U.S.) is standard.”