GoodRx teams with Boehringer on Humira biosimilar
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A new partnership between prescription savings platform GoodRx and drugmaker Boehringer Ingelheim will make the company's Humira knockoff available for a discounted cash pay price of $550.
Why it matters: While it's still not cheap, the price tag for Boehringer's adalimumab-adbm injection represents a 92% discount from what brand-name Humira made by AbbVie generally costs at the pharmacy counter for those who pay cash.
"It's all relative," Dorothy Gemmell, chief commercial officer at GoodRx, told Axios.
- "For anyone that is benefiting because of their rheumatoid arthritis or their ulcerative colitis ... and this helps them live a higher quality of life, we believe people will see this as a significant savings," she said.
- Boehringer Ingelheim rolled out a version of its biosimilar last year at an 81% discount from Humira after initially launching a branded version called Cyltezo at a 5% lower cost.
The big picture: Biosimilars for AbbVie's blockbuster anti-inflammatory drug Humira were first allowed on the market in January 2023, but early demand was sluggish.
- Demand shifted as more biosimilars came online and PBM giant CVS Caremark removed Humira from its formulary earlier this year, although AbbVie has held on to roughly 80% of the market, Reuters reported last month.
- "Doctors are confused about biosimilars. Consumers barely understand brand, generic, retail specialty," Gemmell said.
- Having this option available will educate doctors and pharmacists about the options as they try to help consumers fill the medication, "so we do think that this will drive share of this biosimilar," Gemmell said.
Catch up quick: Boehringer's adalimumab-adbm was the first biosimilar to get Food and Drug Administration approval as an interchangeable drug with Humira, meaning it can be swapped at the pharmacy counter for the brand name.
- At pharmacies that accept GoodRx, patients will be able to get two-packs of both high-concentration and low-concentration versions of the knockoff Humira for $550.
What to watch: AbbVie also has successors to Humira that may recapture some of the market that it's lost, CNBC reported earlier this year.
