Henry Miller shares updates about the latest news on the Wuhan flu outbreak. The first case of the new strand of flu from China was confirmed in the United States this week and the region where the coronavirus originated, near the city of Wuhan in China, has been put under quarantine. ...
Drug supply chain, pricing system reforms will slash healthcare costs, says PRI By Jeff Lagasse As the Trump administration pushes for price caps and government controls to address prescription drug prices, a new issue brief released by the Center for Medical Economics and Innovation at the Pacific Research Institute contends that reforming the complex drug supply chain and ending the current drug pricing system that overcharges patients – along with systemwide reforms – are what's needed to lower America's healthcare costs. Many proposals have been...
Twenty-five years ago, the leading cause of death for adults between the ages of 25 and 44 was complications from HIV. At the time, 50,000 Americans were dying from AIDS-related causes a year, with the African American community particularly hard hit – 49 percent of the people dying from AIDS-related deaths were African Americans. Today, thanks to highly active antiretroviral therapies (HAART), along with other medical advances, people with HIV like basketball great Magic Johnson are living longer and healthier lives. And,...
A recent New York Times editorial about the Food and Drug Administration reflects a systematic weakness at the once-venerable Gray Lady: The members of the editorial board often rely on sloganeering and popular wisdom instead of substantive evidence. The editorial was headlined, “The FDA Is in Trouble. Here’s How to Fix It.” The agency is in trouble. But it’s due to the very kinds of “fixes” the Times recommends. The FDA is highly bureaucratic and risk averse, leading to a slow and expensive drug approval...
Much of the progress in medicine during the past half-century has involved expensive, high-tech diagnostic tests and therapies. The trend in this direction worries health economists and politicians because it has the potential to send already high health care costs into the stratosphere. Health care spending in 2017 reached $3.5 trillion, or a whopping 17.9% of the nation’s gross domestic product, according to government statistics. However, there is an important role as well for ingenious, low-tech, less-expensive approaches to improved health...
Dr. Wayne Winegarden, director of PRI’s Center for Medical Economics and Innovation, breaks down recently-proposed plans in Washington and Sacramento that emphasize price caps and more government control to address prescription drug prices. He discusses the conclusions of his new study on America’s drug pricing challenge, which makes the case that system-wide reforms to improve the complex drug supply chain and increase transparency are what’s needed to lower health care costs. [embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXSIkIWH3X4[/embed]...
As each new year begins, the increases in the list prices of drugs are announced. And, following these announcements, the political class complains that something must be done. This year, following the price announcements, Speaker Nancy Pelosi tweeted “Enough is enough” while Senator Grassley emphasized that a “call to action” on drug prices is needed. Undoubtedly, there are real problems. Unfortunately, the politicians seem more interested in espousing simple talking points rather than effective actions that would simultaneously promote innovation and...
As Washington pushes for price caps and government controls to address prescription drug prices, a new issue brief released today by the Center for Medical Economics and Innovation at the Pacific Research Institute argues that reforming the complex drug supply chain and ending the current drug pricing system that overcharges patients – along with system-wide reforms – are what’s needed to lower America’s health care costs. “Politicians are promoting drug price caps and increased regulation in a futile attempt to increase...
Yesterday the House passed the ill-considered “Pelosi bill” that would impose draconian price controls on drugs. Ignoring the bill’s many adverse impacts, price control advocates like Speaker Pelosi appear to believe that these command and control schemes can solve the systemic health care affordability problem. But, as the latest government data illustrates, such efforts are a fool’s errand. Consider that back in 1960 national health expenditures equaled 5.0% of GDP. Health expenditures have been growing faster than the economy ever since reaching 17.7%...
China has become the world's largest producer and exporter of "active pharmaceutical ingredients," the base components drug companies use to manufacture most of the medications we rely on. China's dominance puts both the health of Americans and our national security at risk. According to the findings of a new report from the U.S.-China Economic Security Review Commission, which was established by Congress in 2000, China's pharmaceutical industry "is not effectively regulated by the Chinese government" and has been responsible for a...
Biosimilars could generate savings of about $116 million in New Jersey annually—including the state’s Medicaid program and patients with commercial insurance, according to a new issue brief by the Center for Medical Economics and Innovation at the Pacific Research Institute. Nationwide, those annual savings could reach $7 billion. PRI is a San Francisco-based free-market think tank. “We broke it down so you can look at it by state total and then breakout how much is for Medicaid which is directly applicable...
Wayne Winegarden, Director for PRI's Center for Medical Economics and Innovation, discusses the many problems with drug price controls on the nationally syndicated Jim Bohannon Show. ...
Once wide coercive powers are given to government agencies…such powers cannot be effectively controlled. F.A. Hayek As part of the chorus calling for drug price controls, the New York Times editorial page has claimed that “Americans will need to accept a trade-off that other advanced nations long since come around to: Slightly fewer new drugs will come to market, in exchange for better prices on the medications that already exist”. There is not one part of this statement that is true. Worse, if the Times’...
Did you catch the story about the swarm of 25,000 bees that had to be captured and removed (by a special police unit, no less) from the Staten Island Ferry Station in New York City? After many years of media reports about honeybees and wild bees dying off, you’d think they were nearly extinct — so what were 25,000 of them doing at a ferry terminal in one of the world’s most densely populated cities? Maybe they heard that New York was...
Listen to PRI's Dr. Henry Miller talk about his recent article on the anniversary of the manufacturing of human insulin by genetically-engineered bacteria on the nationally-syndicated Lars Larson Show. ...
Listen to Dr. Wayne Winegarden, director of PRI's Center for Medical Economics and Innovation, discuss his recent Forbes op-ed on prescription drug price controls and how they would threaten access to innovative cures for America's patients on "The Lars Larson Show." ...
“Three hundred forty-five billion dollars in savings versus the cost of eight to 15 fewer drugs over 10 years, I frankly think it’s worth it.” Rep. Darren Soto (D-FL), hearing before the House Energy and Commerce Committee In the above quote, Representative Soto is defending H.R. 3, the drug price control bill Speaker Nancy Pelosi is advocating. While the Congressman believes that the costs of price controls are “worth it”, patients living with diseases that lack an effective treatment may disagree. While there has...
Lars brings on Dr. Henry Miller, a physician, molecular biologist and Senior Fellow at the Pacific Research Institute, and widely published in both scholarly journals and the popular press to discuss this year’s battle against the ever so deadly flu virus. According to Dr. Miller, “Last flu season, which ran from October 2018 until May 2019, caused up to 42.9 million flu illnesses, up to 647,000 hospitalizations and up to 61,200 flu deaths.” Listen below for more. ...
In September 2018, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) sent an email announcing that it would no longer cover Auryxia®. Auryxia® is an FDA approved medicine that treats iron deficiency anemia (anemia) for patients with chronic kidney disease (CKD) but who are not on dialysis. People with CKD have damaged kidneys that no longer filter their blood properly. Currently, 30 million people in the U.S. are living with CKD, and for these patients, anemia is common. If left untreated,...
Despite their abysmal track record, government solutions are back in vogue. Ostensibly, government’s scale, leverage, and freedom from profit will unlock potential health care savings that are beyond the reach of the private sector. At their most extreme, reforms such as “Medicare for all” call for a complete government takeover of the health care system. Proponents of single payer reforms claim that only a complete government takeover of the health care sector can eliminate the health care sector’s inefficiencies and ensure 100 percent...