A senator's approach to lowering drug prices

Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana treated the uninsured for decades when he worked as a physician. "I saw the tension between the person in front of me who needed affordable medicine and the drug developer motivated by profits to research new treatments needed to save future patients," he writes for STAT. That's why he is prioritizing drug pricing as the ranking member of the Senate's Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee.

It'll be paramount to tease apart the root causes of high drug prices — since each player tends to blame another, when the problems "are diverse and intertwined," he writes. Lowering the cost of medicines remains a bipartisan priority, he says. The HELP committee is focusing on issues like widening access to generic drugs, preventing gamesmanship and loophole exploitation, and reforming PBMs.

scorecard

A look ahead at biotech's third quarter

We're expecting a number of stock-moving events in the third quarter. Per our latest biotech scorecard, we'll hear whether Novo Nordisk's GLP-1 drug, Wegovy, can improve cardiovascular health. Alnylam will find out if its drug patisiran gets expanded FDA approval, and Mersana Therapeutics will reveal whether its antibody-drug conjugate for ovarian cancer was effective in a Phase 3 study.

There are a few noteworthy PDUFA dates in the coming months as well. We'll see if Eisai and Biogen's Alzheimer's drug, Leqembi, gets a full approval. Another one of note is a decision on zuranolone, an experimental drug from Sage Therapeutics and Biogen for major depressive disorder.

marketing

Physicians eating well on Novo Nordisk's dime

Novo Nordisk offered up more than 457,000 meals as part of its diabetes and weight loss marketing plan, according to federal records. Specifically, it spent some $11 million on food and travel last year for nearly 12,000 doctors, all in the name of education on GLP-1 drugs like Ozempic, Victoza, and Saxenda. One physician, who speaks frequently for the company, ate 193 times last year on Novo Nordisk's dime.

It's standard practice for drugmakers to meet with doctors over meals, but Novo Nordisk's approach is concerning to conflict-of-interest experts.

"When you have a physician eating out with the [company] reps more often than they're eating at home, it suggests that this is excessive," one Yale researcher of drug company advertising said. "No physician needs to hear the same lecture 150 times in order to better understand these drugs."

oncology

AstraZeneca's stock drops on not-good-enough cancer data

AstraZeneca's experimental lung cancer drug, datopotamab deruxtecan, worked better than standard-of-care chemotherapy, according to newly released data, but the results weren't dazzling enough for investors. The drug's performance wasn't "clinically meaningful," per J.P. Morgan analysts, and on Monday shares tumbled 5% on the news.

AstraZeneca agreed to pay up to $6 billion to Daiichi Sankyo to collaborate on the drug. An interim analysis of a Phase 3 trial showed that it did improve progression-free survival in non-small cell lung cancer and, according to analysts, still has a shot at winning approval.

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