Turing to Cut Price of Anti-Parasite Drug
November 20 2015 - 4:20PM
Dow Jones News
Turing Pharmaceuticals AG, the small drug maker that gained
notoriety for raising the price of an anti-parasite tablet more
than 50-fold, is drawing up plans to discount the drug as much as
50% to hospitals, according to a person familiar with the
matter.
Even with the discounts, the drug—Daraprim—would still cost
hospitals far more than it did before Turing bought the U.S. rights
in August and raised the price to $750 a tablet, from $13.50. The
amount of the discount will depend on how much of the drug
hospitals use, the person said.
Nor would the discounts be given for out-of-hospital use, so
health insurers would have to pick up the tab for patients who keep
taking the drug after leaving the hospital, the person said.
How much Turing would cut the cost of Daraprim has been a
question since the company and Chief Executive Martin Shkreli drew
criticism for the price hike from patient advocates and politicians
including Democratic presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and
Bernie Sanders.
The Wall Street Journal reported in September that Turing would
cut the price, but was still working out by how much.
The discounts that Turing is considering could be announced next
week, the person said.
Daraprim is a half-century-old drug that treats an infection
from the toxoplasma parasite that can threaten the lives of HIV
patients, pregnant women and others with weakened immune systems.
Each year, more than a million people in the U.S. deal with the
infections.
Turing's price rise became a featured example of the massive
price increases that several pharmaceutical companies have taken,
even though the companies hadn't done the research behind the
medicine. Democrats in Congress have launched investigations.
Privately held Turing, a nine-months-old startup founded by
hedge-fund manager Mr. Shkreli, countered that it was using the
higher revenues from the Daraprim price hike to fund its own drug
research-and-development programs.
The hospital discounts are among a number of steps that Turing
plans to address the impact of Daraprim's higher price, the person
familiar with the matter said.
Turing also will start selling bottles containing 30 tablets,
which the person said should help hospitals that don't use a lot of
the pills and don't go through all of the 100-tablet bottles that
have been on sale.
In addition, Turing will start giving out free samples to
doctors for starting patients on the drug, the person said.
After raising $90 million during its first financing round in
August, Turing plans a new round with the goal of raising another
$50 million to $100 million by early next year, the person familiar
with the matter said.
The latest financing would value Turing at roughly $500 million
and be the next step toward taking Turing public later in the year,
the person said.
Mr. Shkreli gained control of a majority of shares of KaloBios
Pharmaceuticals Inc. earlier this week, after the biotech announced
it was running out of cash and would wind down operations. Turing
doesn't have plans to reverse merge into KaloBios in order to go
public, the person said.
Write to Jonathan D. Rockoff at Jonathan.Rockoff@wsj.com
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(END) Dow Jones Newswires
November 20, 2015 17:05 ET (22:05 GMT)
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