Congressman Elijah Cummings has launched an investigation into pharmaceutical pricing practices.
The representative for Maryland's 7th congressional district, on Monday requested information on price increases, investment in research and development, and corporate strategies to preserve market share and pricing power from 12 multinational pharmaceutical firms.
A Republican Congressman has been arrested by the FBI over on charges of insider trading with shares in Australian biopharmaceutical firm Innate Immunotherapeutics, a company for which he serves as a board member.
Chris Collins, the United States Representative for New York’s 27th congressional district and the first sitting member of congress to endorse current President Donald Trump, reportedly turned himself into the government over the charges.
President Barack Obama put pen to paper on the 21st Century Cures Act on 13 December, which commits to investing $6.3 billion in new spending on a wide range of health related issues over the next decade. Perhaps the biggest commitment is the $1.8 billion investment in cancer research, in Vice President Joe Biden’s “moonshot” that aims to “win the war on cancer”. The bill encompasses a broad range of health related issues, including research and funding upon cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, opioid addiction, medical devices, mental health issues, and access to new drugs.
The US congress is again subjecting the pharmaceutical industry to heavy scrutiny over drug pricing policies with Mylan its latest target after it emerged that the generic drugmaker has raised the price of its allergy device EpiPen more than 400% since 2008.
A particular matter of contention is that the rise in the price of EpiPen coincided with a 671% increase in the salary of Mylan CEO Heather Bresch.
With EpiPen enjoying a market share of around 90%, lawmakers have criticised the drugmaker for using its position to hike prices.
Pharmaceutical industry executives came under intense scrutiny at a Congressional hearing in the US as the debate over the spiralling cost of prescription drugs deepened.
Perhaps the most well-known name in this debate, Martin Shkreli, had been compelled to attend the hearing of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. But the former Turing chief executive refused to testify, pleading the Fifth Amendment on the advice of his newly-appointed legal team.