In 2022 , three US opioid wholesalers — AmerisourceBergen , Cardinal Health and McKesson — and Johnson & Johnson , who made generic opioid , agreed to pay nearly $ 26 billion to settle opioid-related lawsuits . There was plenty of guilt to go around . And it wasn ’ t just drug makers and sellers who were implicated in the opioid crisis . Medical associations and academies were also found to have had their hands in the cookie jar .
Research published in 2015 in the non-profit Annual Reviews revealed that : “ Between 1996 and 2002 , Purdue Pharma funded more than 20,000 pain-related educational programs through direct sponsorship or financial grants and launched a multifaceted campaign to encourage longterm use of OPRs [ opioid pain relievers ] for chronic noncancer pain . As part of this campaign , Purdue provided financial support to the American Pain Society , the American Academy of Pain Medicine , the Federation of State Medical Boards , the Joint Commission , pain patient groups , and other organizations . In turn , these groups all advocated for more aggressive identification and treatment of pain , especially use of OPRs .”
In The Last Decade , Drug Prices Have Soared
Before and during the opioid crisis , prescription drug prices also skyrocketed , leading to Congressional hearings . “ What the Committee has learned should be troubling to lawmakers , taxpayers , and any American who has ever struggled to afford their prescriptions ,” said New York Rep . Carolyn B . Maloney , Chairwoman of the Committee on Oversight and Reform to committee members after drug price investigations in 2021 .
“ Drug companies have raised prices relentlessly for decades while manipulating the patent system and other laws to delay competition from lower-priced generics . These companies have specifically targeted the US market for higher prices , even while cutting prices in other countries because weaknesses in our health care system have allowed them to get away with outrageous prices and anticompetitive conduct .”
Some of the biggest cost increases were seen in the price of insulin which rose by 54 percent between 2014 to 2019 and the anti-parasitic drug Daraprim which was repriced from $ 13.50 to $ 750 in 2015 by Turing Pharmaceuticals founder Martin Shkreli . Adding to dramatic price hikes , the drug giant Mylan raised the price of EpiPen , the emergency allergy injection that so many relied upon , to $ 600 from $ 100 with no warning . Revelations that the former president and CEO of EpiPen drugmaker Mylan , Heather Bresch , was the daughter of then North Carolina senator Joe Manchin intensified questions about government / Big Pharma conflicts of interest and faulty regulation .
Some of the most outrageous prices seen in the US were in drugs that could , for the first , time cure hepatitis C , a liver-attacking virus that can lead to cancer , cirrhosis and the necessity of having a transplant . Until then , drugs merely treated the condition but the new drug class actually cured the disease .
Gilead Science priced Sovaldi , one of the first such hepatitis C drugs , at a shocking $ 1,000 a pill or $ 84,000 for a course of treatment — extortion pricing said some .
Lawmakers
This hard-hitting exposé by leading national muckraker Martha Rosenberg blows the lid off of everything you thought you knew about Big Pharma and Big Food . What goes on behind the scenes in these industries is more suspicious , more devious , more disreputable than you could have ever imagined .
If you ’ re concerned about the safety of the drugs you take and the food you eat , you owe it to yourself to read this important book .
Order nowf https :// www . amazon . com / Big-Food-Pharma- Lies-Pharmaceutical / dp / 1633889351
$ 21.95 Paperback 396 pages Prometheus Books ISBN 978-1-63388-935-4 worried that the opportunistic prices would sack entitlement programs and they did ; in 2014 alone , Medicare and Medicaid spent over $ 5 billion on Sovaldi and Gilead ’ s follow-up drug , Harvoni .
In 2017 , Harvoni ad campaigns on TV , in broadcast and on posters along train commuter lines unabashedly stressed screening , warning people that if they were born between 1945 and 1965 , they could have hepatitis C , not even know it . Even if you have no symptoms you might silently be at risk and need these drugs said the Pharma messaging , often called “ disease mongering ” because it employs fear of diseases to grow customers and screening as a marketing tool to enlarge demand and the “ patient pool .”
The shift to scare tactics and a push for screening was not a coincidence . According to the pharmaceutical trade website Fierce Pharma , Gilead ’ s hepatitis blockbusters at the time were “ in freefall , and its pool of eligible patients has shrunk dramatically thanks to the success of its meds .” If “ all baby boomers got tested for the virus , though ? That could help stem the tide — and it ’ s exactly the move the company is recommending with its latest awareness push ,” continued the site .
36 x The Trial Lawyer