That is the topic of a recent BioSpace article titled “How Effective Will TrumpRx and Other Direct-to-Consumer Drug Pricing Initiatives Be?” A am quoted in the article as follows:
While [direct-to-consumer] DTC has been a growing trend in biopharma for nearly two years now—Lilly launched LillyDirect in January 2024—the number of drugmakers looking to sell their products directly to patients has spiked in recent months.
Drug pricing is a delicate issue and pharmas have long been under pressure to improve access to medicines. “The goal of drug pricing is to set them high enough so pharmaceutical companies are incentivized to fund the research and development needed to bring new drugs to the market,” Jason Shafrin, senior managing director of the Center for Healthcare Economics & Policy at FTI Consulting, told BioSpace in an email.
On the flipside, drugs must be priced “so that the benefit to society outweighs the cost,” he added.
On both counts, Shafrin, along with other experts that spoke to BioSpace for this piece, questioned the effectiveness of the DTC approach.
You can read the full article here.
