Since 2009, the price of the EpiPen, an epinephrine injector used in emergency situations to reverse the effects of a severe allergic attack, has risen by 600 percent—despite the drug being decades old. The reason seems to be little more than the near-monopoly status of the drug, which was purchased by drug company Mylan in 2007. After reaching $600 or more for a two-dose pack, it’s causing patients and parents to contemplate going without.
“I called the insurance company and asked why it was so high and was told that, actually, it’s $700 total, and my co-pay is $400,” she said.
For the first time in 10 years, Ms. Shulman said she briefly considered forgoing the purchase, but didn’t want to risk it. “It’s very wrong,” she said. “It’s gouging parents about their children’s lives. It’s not like letting them sniffle. It’s life or death.” [...]
The price hike has caught the attention of Washington lawmakers. Senator Amy Klobuchar, Democrat of Minnesota, who has a daughter who carries an EpiPen, has called on the Senate Judiciary Committee and the Federal Trade Commission to review whether the price hikes violate any anti-competition rules. Last year, the drug maker Sanofi recalled a competing product, Auvi-Q, because it may not have been delivering the correct amount of epinephrine, leaving the EpiPen as the primary emergency treatment for severe allergic reactions.
“This is a mainstream product that people carry, and it’s getting harder and harder for people to afford it,” said Senator Klobuchar. “It’s just another example of what we keep seeing, outrageous price increases when a monopoly situation ends up in a company’s lap.”
The drug contained in an EpiPen expires after a year, meaning allergy suffers must purchase new pens on a regular basis regardless of whether or not they are used.
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At Daily Kos on this date in 2011—Michelle Rhee still refuses to answer questions about cheating scandal:
"Why won't Michelle Rhee talk to USA Today," The New York Timesasks.
USA Today, of course, broke the story of suspicious erasure patterns on standardized tests taken by Washington, D.C. students during Rhee's tenure as the city's schools chancellor. The story was the product of serious investigative journalism by reporters Jack Gillum and Marisol Bello, who marshaled significant amounts of data as well as talking to parents, academics, DC schools administrators and the consultant hired to do a cursory investigation of the possibility of cheating. But Rhee would not talk to them.
Now, the Times is telling the story of Rhee's refusal. Michael Winerip contrasts her typical eagerness to talk to the press—"It’s hard to find a media outlet, big or small, that she hasn’t talked to. [...] Always, she preens for the cameras"—with her determined evasion of the USA Today reporters.
On today’s Kagro in the Morning show, we’re live again, back from the south of the Great White North! Trump catch-up day includes the new “campaign” staff, saving the day with Play-Doh, “safe spaces,” and whether or not a racist Trump “media empire” is now the true endgame.
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