The pharmaceutical industry's 2 leading trade groups both set records for lobbying spending in 2018 — a sign of just how much the industry believes is on the line in the political battle over drug prices.
By the numbers: PhRMA, the industry's largest trade organization, spent $27.5 million on lobbying last year, per Bloomberg. That's the most it has ever spent in 1 year. A full $10 million of that came in the first quarter — the most PhRMA has ever spent in a single quarter.
The amount that people with Type 1 diabetes spent on insulin, before subtracting rebates and discounts, doubled from 2012 to 2016 while daily insulin use mostly stayed flat, according to a report from the Health Care Cost Institute, which analyzed health insurance claims from that time span.
The big picture: There are some limitations with the report's data. Regardless, insulin prices and out-of-pocket costs have enraged diabetic patients and parents, who have been at the forefront of the drug pricing debate by explaining how difficult it is to obtain the life-or-death medication.
Turns out the Trump administration's big Affordable Care Act regulation packs a bit more punch than we realized at first.
How it works: Some of the rule's technical changes will end up requiring people to pay more for their coverage, while rolling back the cost of federal premium subsidies. People who get a subsidy under the ACA have to pay a certain percentage of their income for insurance premiums; the government picks up the rest.
The number of price increases on brand-name drugs fell by about half from 2015 through 2018, according to data provided to Axios and compiled by 46brooklyn Research, a nonprofit firm that tracks drug prices.
Yes, but: Several companies still raised list prices frequently and at rates well above inflation, and many medications that saw higher prices had already lost patent protection or are nearing a patent expiration.
