Negative impact largely priced into shares of EpiPen-maker Mylan, analyst says
- by Douglas Reid
- in Health Care
- — Oct 2, 2016
Last year, more than 3.6 million US prescriptions for two-packs of EpiPens were filled, according to data firm IMS Health.
The whole experience was filled with yelling, frustration, and a whole lot of EpiPens and poster board charts. "I'm a very conservative, pro-business Republican, but I'm really sickened by what I've heard here today and what I've read before about this situation", said Rep. John Duncan, Jr.
Tammy Duckworth, a Democrat from IL, questioned Bresch about the company's EpiPen4Schools program, which is now the subject of an antitrust probe in NY.
Holding up an EpiPen, Chaffetz told the packed hearing room he found it "a little hard to believe" that Mylan only made about $50 in profits on each auto-injector it sells when the "juice", as he called it costs about $1.00. After costs - including giving almost 700,000 free EpiPens to schools - the company makes only $50 on each injector, she said.
There seems to be bipartisan agreement in the House that Mylan's price increases were not necessary, especially as Bresch and four other top executives have earned $292.1 million over five years, reports Time.
When faced with questions on the ethics of EpiPen price hikes, Bresch a few times pointed to Mylan's stock epinephrine program for schools.
Questions about coming EpiPen competition and larger structural trends that are shifting costs to consumers, however, remained unresolved.
"You're trying to make us feel good", he said. As Bresch defended her company and said she was surprised by the outrage, Chaffetz asked her, "You never anticipated this? You did not want to cut the price on the brand because you would not get the rebates you are getting now". Throckmorton declined to say if the agency was reviewing any other applications and if so, how many. He insisted that it would be illegal to say.
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One possibility is that Mylan execs took advantage of a near monopoly on the market to turn EpiPen into a cash cow. In the case of EpiPen, the supply curve and demand curve both shifted, yielding a new relationship that certainly resulted in an increase in quantity.
What role does the PBM play in all of this? The FAIR Drug Pricing Act would require drug manufacturers to alert the government about a more than 10% price increase and justify the change in a report.
That's a "more ominous threat" to Mylan than the company's launch of a cheaper generic, according to Raymond James analyst Elliot Wilbur. You're saying that over a 9-year period, your company saved the country $180 billion by simply being in the generics business?
"You've been in these hallways to ask us to make people buy your stuff", Mulvaney told Bresch, whose father is U.S. Sen.
After coming under fire from the public over the increasingly higher prices Mylan was charging for its EpiPen, an emergency epinephrine auto-injector, CEO Heather Bresch was taken to task by lawmakers on Wednesday, and it wasn't pretty to watch.
What's the story with Mylan's patient assistance programs? Bresch did not provide many specifics. "But then they go right ahead and keep raising their prices".
Increased awareness among doctors and patients about the importance of epinephrine could account for some of the increase seen in the study, said Richard Lockey, a past president of both the World Allergy Organization and the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology. Bresch also didn't answer the question directly whether Mylan had a six-year plan to consistently raise the price of the EpiPen.
