Effective Jan. 1, 2020, Repatha will have a list price of $5,850 for all insurers and the drug will no longer be sold at the higher price.
Amgen began offering an identical version of Repatha in 2018 with the lower list price, but still supplied the drug with the original list price. The company said it kept the higher-priced version available to allow time for insurers and pharmacy benefit managers to adjust to the loss in rebates.
The decision to discontinue the higher-priced drug could help reduce the amount patients pay at pharmacy counters and reduce the number of patients who don’t fill their prescriptions because of the cost, according to The Wall Street Journal.
Roughly half of Medicare Part D patients taking Repatha will have copays of less than $50 per prescription next year, and by discontinuing the higher-priced version, the company expects to increase the number of patients eligible for the lower copay.
When Repatha was approved in 2015, analysts thought it would bring billions in revenue, according to the WSJ. But, that didn’t happen, largely because insurers have restricted coverage of the drug because of its price.
Read the full article here.
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