(C) Common Dreams
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Merck Sues Over Law Empowering Medicare to Negotiate With Drugmakers [1]
['Rebecca Robbins']
Date: 2023-06-06
The pharmaceutical company Merck sued the government on Tuesday over a federal law that empowers Medicare for the first time to negotiate prices directly with drugmakers.
Merck’s lawsuit, filed in federal court in Washington, is the drug industry’s most significant move so far to fight back against a substantial change to health policy, which will go into effect in 2026. Democrats pushed through the Medicare-negotiation program last summer as a provision of the Inflation Reduction Act, framing it as a way of lowering drug prices.
Only some drugs will be subject to negotiation with Medicare and only after they have been on the market without competition for years. But Merck, which generated $14.5 billion in profit last year, claimed in a statement on Tuesday that the law would stifle the ability of it and its peers to make risky investments in new cures.
Other drug companies have suggested that they will choose to cut certain drug development programs because of the projected dent to their revenue. Several have already said they were reassessing their research plans.
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[1] Url:
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/06/business/merck-medicare-drug-prices.html
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