Drug Goes From $13.50 a Tablet to $750, Overnight. More increases to come!

Appears "hedge fund" managers are getting into the drug game by buying the "rights" of older drugs that have been used for decades and simply "increasing the price by x50 or x100". This should be as illegal as gas stations gouging customers or colusion to gouge customers in the energy sector.

www.cnbc.com...|finance|headline|headline|story&par=yahoo&doc=1030120 76

Specialists in infectious disease are protesting a gigantic overnight increase in the price of a 62-year-old drug that is the standard of care for treating a life-threatening parasitic infection.

The drug, called Daraprim, was acquired in August by Turing Pharmaceuticals, a start-up run by a former hedge fund manager. Turing immediately raised the price to $750 a tablet from $13.50, bringing the annual cost of treatment for some patients to hundreds of thousands of dollars.

"What is it that they are doing differently that has led to this dramatic increase?" said Dr. Judith Aberg, the chief of the division of infectious diseases at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. She said the price increase could force hospitals to use "alternative therapies that may not have the same efficacy."

Turing's price increase is not an isolated example. While most of the attention on pharmaceutical prices has been on new drugs for diseases like cancer, hepatitis C and high cholesterol, there is also growing concern about huge price increases on older drugs, some of them generic, that have long been mainstays of treatment.

Cycloserine, a drug used to treat dangerous multidrug-resistant tuberculosis, was just increased in price to $10,800 for 30 pills from $500 after its acquisition by Rodelis Therapeutics. Scott Spencer, general manager of Rodelis, said the company needed to invest to make sure the supply of the drug remained reliable.

In August, two members of Congress investigating generic drug price increases wrote to Valeant Pharmaceuticals after that company acquired two heart drugs, Isuprel and Nitropress, from Marathon Pharmaceuticals and promptly raised their prices by 525 percent and 212 percent respectively.

Martin Shkreli, the founder and chief executive of Turing, said that the drug is so rarely used that the impact on the health system would be minuscule and that Turing would use the money it earns to develop better treatments for toxoplasmosis, with fewer side effects.

a reply to: infolurker

Patents and copyrights provide the circumstances necessary to allow monopoly prices.

Except for physical material monopolies such as diamond mines, it couldn't be done without the indispensable tool of state enforcement.

Bad company, even worse economic interventionist "law".

And Congress will stand on the bodies of those that died unable to afford the drug they needed swearing to get to the bottom of it while big pharma continues to buy them off...

And tge lemmings will continue to vote Republican or Democrat hoping this time will be different.

Who the hell is going to buy this drug?
If it's a parasitic fighting drug it means that people who most likely will get infected aren't going to be rich snobby people. Maybe one or two people a year who can afford it might contract the parasite.
It's just like snake venom, not all hospitals have antidotes and if they do it's very expensive.
Luckily this isn't like snake bites or gasoline, hospitals have choices, patients have choices, and people are going to choose the cheaper choice in this case.

here's an excellent opportunity for rogue China corporations to make rip-off copies of the rare drugs which the vulture capitalist hedge fund managers price at a new unreasonable rate...

a $750. dollar pill, upped from $13.50
or a 30 day supply upped to $10k by these money hungry sociopaths not content with the tiny profits from the old price of $500.
~I can agree with a punishment of forced sterilization so that kind of person is eliminated from the gene pool ~

The names, photos and work address of the people responsible for these price increases, needs to be made public. Since government will do nothing, the "community" needs to be given a chance to determine the consequences of these individuals actions.

I was under the impression when I read this that these are generic that have alternatives or patents have long since expired. That made me think this was playing off the stupidity of insurance and their formularies.

originally posted by: Iamthatbish
I was under the impression when I read this that these are generic that have alternatives or patents have long since expired. That made me think this was playing off the stupidity of insurance and their formularies.

Could be, I don't know drug laws but it does seem a bit like copyrighting "Happy Birthday" or patenting hot soup.

If it is an unfounded claim, it could be just another hit piece against "speculators" (i.e. investors).

When i see things like this I wonder if someone found that the anti parasitic drug works to cure cancer or something

If you raise your price too much aren't you creating an opportunity for someone else to compete with you?

a reply to: strongfp

If it's a parasitic fighting drug it means that people who most likely will get infected aren't going to be rich snobby people.

If this is shipped out to 3rd world countries as aid, Uncle Sam foots the bill and that may be what these companies are counting on. Most American insurance companies are not going to shell out that much and the average Joe sure as hell ain't got that kind of money, so Drs will just find some way around it.
More proof they could care less if we live or die, as long as they make a profit.

I really hate people who only care about their own profits and gains at any cost... I'm all about capitalism, but only to a certain degree. I don't think people should work for nothing, I do believe companies should fit in healthy margins for their own companies benefit, but this here, is highway robbery, and highway robbery to those who may be dependent on these drugs.. I really wish someone would let these hedgefund managers know they can't take their wealth down to hell with them once they're dead...

Why do people still say the US has a health care system. It is just part of corrupt and greedy big business.

It is just market manipulation, like bitcoin and altcoins. No one cares about the drug or the stock, a couple of folks do and the ones that do are trying to make a little bank. nothing to see here

originally posted by: greencmp
a reply to: infolurker

Patents and copyrights provide the circumstances necessary to allow monopoly prices.

Except for physical material monopolies such as diamond mines, it couldn't be done without the indispensable tool of state enforcement.

Bad company, even worse economic interventionist "law".

geez....now if we only had a congress that would force these companies to back the hell down with punitive legislation...how can any congressmen not immediately vote to end this crap?....oh yeah, they are too busy formulating a plan to shutdown the government over planned parenthood, and of course you have them salivating over the E-mail hearings with Hillary Clinton....priorities, priorites

It just goes to show you that even a 60 year old drug can still be profitable long after the initial investment, R&D and marketing have been recouped.

This is why I don't believe the myth that big pharma suppresses drugs for autism, cancer and AIDS. There are plenty of ways that big pharma can manipulate the supply and price of such drugs (as in this case) in order to keep reaping profits for decades upon decades.

It helps though -- believing that magical cures are somehow secreted away in labs under the guise of profit than the actual cold, hard reality: the are no magic bullets...yet.

Hell, even aspirin that is out of patent still is a cash cow for pharmaceutical companies.

a reply to: jimmyx

Im sure they actually benefit from it one way or another, health care for profit..sounds like an awesome idea. The various health care entities and companies lobby and shell out big time$$ to get their roads paved in gold.

a reply to: jimmyx

You do have a congress. Instead of doing the something that you imagine it would do, it does what it cannot imagine not to do, manipulate markets. The only capable restraint to monopoly prices is the free market. Without it, you get things like this.

That said, my larger point is simply that patents aren't as defensible as many of us believe.

Monopolies exist but, they only become a problem if they gain the position necessary to exercise monopoly prices on a necessary commodity. For example, you might write a book and have a monopoly of its publication but, can you charge monopoly prices? Does everyone need your book?

The whole story might be bunk but the subject is worth discussing.

originally posted by: DAVID64
a reply to: strongfp

If it's a parasitic fighting drug it means that people who most likely will get infected aren't going to be rich snobby people.

If this is shipped out to 3rd world countries as aid, Uncle Sam foots the bill and that may be what these companies are counting on. Most American insurance companies are not going to shell out that much and the average Joe sure as hell ain't got that kind of money, so Drs will just find some way around it.
More proof they could care less if we live or die, as long as they make a profit.

An excellent point and the most likely explanation.

The cost of so many things even with health insurance is infuriating! My husband who could always afford his diabetes meds all of a sudden hit some donut hole and his prices sky rocketed to outrageous prices until a limit could be met. It took a while to get any kind of help from anywhere.

I swear, more and more people are going to die because of greed!

Drug manufacturing is just chemistry, and chemistry is just cooking on a molecular level. If you have the right kitchen, the correct ingredients, cooks and recipe -- clone drugs or copies can be made for pennies on the dollar.

The cost is in the research to develop the recipe in the first place. That's where the big money is spent. Patents will only protect your new wonder drug in countries that recognize the patent. There are many places in the world where patents mean little to nothing, and reagents, lab equipment and disenfranchised chemists are all to happy to set up shop.

If anything, these insane prices for drugs are only helping to create a pharmaceutical black market. Who knows, maybe big pharma has planned for this and intends to play both sides of the field -- similar to the government plays both sides in the drug war? If there's money to be made, and a black market is an eventuality ... why not get your hands on some of that cash as well?