Amgen, Eli Lilly, Merck and the Association of National Advertisers are suing the Trump administration over its rule forcing pharmaceutical companies to display drugs' list prices in TV commercials. They say the rule violates the First Amendment and exceeds the government's authority.
The big picture: Experts expected drugmakers to file such a lawsuit — even though the new regulation isn't expected to actually affect drug pricing.
The price of Zynteglo, a new gene therapy made by Bluebird Bio, will be almost €1.6 million ($1.8 million) in Europe, the company said Friday. Bluebird expects to get FDA approval for Zynteglo next year and to price it similarly in the U.S., Reuters reports.
The big picture: Zynteglo becomes the second-most expensive drug in the world behind Zolgensma, the $2.1 million gene therapy made by Novartis.
It's easy to criticize the U.S. health care system for high spending and poor outcomes, but American patients may also be the problem, the Atlantic's David Freedman writes.
What's happening: One study found that 74% of the variation in life expectancy within the U.S. was attributable to lifestyle factors like smoking and inactivity — behaviors decided by patients, not doctors. AndAmerican patients don't like to be told they can't have expensive care, using more speciality care and emergency care than other countries.
In thelatestattempt to address the ongoing measles outbreak, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed a bill on Thursday ending vaccination exemptions based on religious beliefs, reports the New York Times.
Why it matters: New York City has long been trying to figure out how to combat the measles outbreak — particularly because of the resistance of the ultra-Orthodox Jewish community to vaccinations. Cuomo said he understands the importance of religious freedom, but protecting public health is equally important, per the NYT.
The long-simmering Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo entered a new and more ominous phase this week, with the cross-border spread of a handful of cases into western Uganda.
Why it matters: The cross-border spread puts more pressure on the World Health Organization to declare the nearly yearlong outbreak a public health emergency, which it has proven reluctant to do. A committee will meet Friday to determine whether to take that step.
A top member of the House Oversight Committee sent a letter to Juul last week asking for a vast amount of internal records, the Daily Beast reports.
Details: Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi asked for details about the company's advertising strategies, its knowledge of its products' health impacts and its business arrangements with Altria.
The collective stock prices of the largest health care companies have recovered pretty much all of their losses from April, when analysts and algorithms soured on the industry over fears of "Medicare for All" and other looming changes.
The bottom line: The health care industry is still extremely profitable, and Wall Street has the attention span of a gnat.
