ICYMI: New analysis shows U.S. brand-name medicines rose just 0.7 percent in second quarter

In case you missed it, a new analysis from SSR Health found after rebates and discounts, brand-name prescription drug prices rose just 0.7 percent in the second quarter from the previous year.

Assertions that medicine prices are “skyrocketing” make for provocative headlines, but as this new analysis shows, these claims are based solely on the list prices of medicines which do not reflect the substantial – and typical – discounts negotiated by payers. To help ensure that patients are not adversely impacted by ill-conceived, short-sighted policy “solutions,” conversations on costs need to move beyond political hyperbole to a fulsome discussion about how our nation’s competitive biopharmaceutical marketplace works to control costs.

Check out a few highlights below and read the story here.

• SSR Health’s analysis found after rebates and discounts, U.S. brand-name drug prices rose just 0.7 percent in the second quarter from the previous year. That compares with a 4.4 percent rise in the second quarter of 2014.
• According to Richard Evans, an analyst at SSR Health, brand-name drug price inflation “is about as low as it has been in a very long time.”
• The analysis found most of the change was driven by price declines in a handful of disease categories including hepatitis C and diabetes. Hepatitis C therapy prices declined 25 percent and prices for long-acting insulin drugs declined 18 percent in the second quarter.

Read more about how our nation's competitive biopharmaceutical marketplace controls costs while encouraging the development of new treatments and cures here.