Posted by Michael Wonder on 09 Aug 2018
Will courts allow states to regulate drug prices?
9 August 2018 - Pharmaceuticals are consuming increasingly large portions of U.S. state budgets, and high prices are preventing patients from getting, and adhering to, essential medicines.
In mid-May 2018, President Donald Trump announced a heavily hyped but relatively modest federal plan to bring down drug prices. Meanwhile, several states are moving forward with their own solutions, and Maryland’s approach is particularly ambitious.
In 2017, responding to notorious cases such as the 5000% increase in the cost of Daraprim (pyrimethamine) and the 10-fold increase in the cost of EpiPens (epinephrine auto-injectors), Maryland enacted a statute that prohibits manufacturers from “price gouging” on any “essential off-patent or generic drug”.
