Pharmalittle: Biotech investors push to extend time before Medicare price negotiations; RiteAid closings could cause pharmacy deserts

By Ed Silverman Oct. 18, 2023

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Alex Hogan/STAT

Good morning, everyone, and how are you today? We are doing just fine, thank you. After all, the birds are still chirping and a cool breeze is wafting by the surprisingly sedate Pharmalot campus. Moreover, this marks the middle of the week, which means we have managed to survive this far. And this calls for celebration, yes? So please join us as we hoist another cup of delicious stimulation. Remember, no prescription is required, so there is no need to negotiate rebates. Our choice today is cinnamon hazelnut. Meanwhile, here are a few items of interest. Have a grand day, and drop us a line if you hear something juicy. …

Investors in biopharma companies, who lobbied vigorously — but unsuccessfully — against allowing Medicare to negotiate drug prices, are trying a new tactic to preserve their profits, The Boston Globe tells us. A group called the Incubate Coalition, comprising the venture capital firms that bankroll most biotech startups, is pressing U.S. lawmakers to extend by four years the time that pills can be on the market before they become subject to price negotiations with Medicare. Such an extension could mean billions of dollars in extra profits to biopharma companies and their investors over time — and billions in additional costs to Medicare and its recipients.

Treatments like Ozempic, Wegovy, and Mounjaro have been hailed for showing 15% to over 20% weight loss in trials, but those are just averages. In reality, there are big variations in how much weight people lose on the therapies, and it is not clear why those differences exist. One way researchers are trying to figure this out is by focusing on genes, STAT explains. This line of research is part of a growing movement by the field of obesity medicine to better understand the different causes of obesity and to try to tailor treatments. Persistent shortages and high costs have increased pressure to understand whether there are subsets of patients that would benefit most from taking the drugs.

Rite Aid plans to close more stores as part of its bankruptcy process and the move could hurt access to medicine and care, particularly in some majority Black and Hispanic neighborhoods and in rural areas, the Associated Press writes. The drug-store chain says that its voluntary Chapter 11 process will allow it to speed up plans to close underperforming stores, which could number as many as 500 of the more than 2,000 outlets the company runs, mostly on the East and West coasts. Closings can create so-called “pharmacy deserts” in poor neighborhoods where residents are less likely to own cars and a drugstore is more than half a mile away.

More than one-third of Americans who could benefit from pre-exposure prophylaxis, or PrEP, for HIV received a prescription for it in 2022, The Hill notes, citing preliminary data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Expanding PrEP use is a key part of a CDC program to end the HIV epidemic in the U.S. and reduce HIV infections in the country by 90% by 2030. PrEP has been available in the U.S. since 2012, and coverage of it has continued to rise in recent years — 36% of those who could benefit from PrEP were prescribed it last year. Between 2017 and 2021, annual new HIV infections fell by 12%. But disparities persist across gender and race.

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