LOS ANGELES--(BUSINESS WIRE)--A group of committed AIDS activists and advocates spearheaded by AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF) will protest New Jersey’s own Merck & Company, Inc. on Thursday, July 28th, starting at 8:30 a.m. over its pricing and policies on its HIV/AIDS medications. The protest is being held in front of Merck’s headquarters in Whitehouse Station (1 Merck Drive, NJ 08889) in light of the severe crisis facing the nation’s AIDS Drug Assistance Program (ADAP), a network of federal and state funded, state-run programs that provide life-saving HIV treatments to low income, uninsured, and underinsured individuals living with HIV/AIDS nationwide. Protesters will chant ‘Merck, do the right thing!’ as company employees and executives arrive for work in an effort to spotlight the steep prices that Merck charges government programs like ADAP for its blockbuster HIV/AIDS drug, Isentress (raltegravir) — currently over $8,000 per patient, per year for ADAP — the most expensive first-line drug.
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WHAT: |
AIDS DRUG PRICING PROTEST at MERCK | |
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— outside Merck’s Whitehouse Station, NJ headquarters |
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WHEN: |
THURSDAY, July 28th, 2011 |
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8:30 AM Eastern Time |
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WHERE: |
outside | |
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Merck & Co., Inc. Headquarters |
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| 1 Merck Drive (at the intersection of Route 22 and Route 523) | ||
| Whitehouse Station, NJ 08889 | ||
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CONTACTS: |
Ged Kenslea, AHF Communications Director, cell: 323-791-5526, office: 323-308-1833 |
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Jessica Reinhart, AHF Grassroots Community Manager, cell: 323-203-6146 |
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“Merck refuses to lower prices for cash-strapped AIDS Drug Assistance Programs, leaving over 8,600 vulnerable Americans on ADAP waiting lists, unable to get their medicines,” said Timothy Boyd, Policy Research Coordinator for AIDS Healthcare Foundation and a participant in the protest. “ADAP is the payer of last resort for thousands of people with AIDS who cannot afford their medicines. However, due to the high price of AIDS drugs such as Isentress, this program can no longer afford to help those who rely on it. Given that Merck sells its medicines ‘at cost’ for a few hundred dollars per year in developing countries, it can lower prices significantly and still make a huge profit, yet it has not. ADAP can no longer afford to pay for this and other Merck drugs without price relief. Merck must do the right thing and immediately lower prices for ADAP — thousands of lives are at risk.”
“The problem within the system is the money is in the meds, not the cure, and we can’t be effective in fighting a disease where drug company CEOs dictate treatment plans,” said William Francis, Executive Director/CEO of the Citywide Project, Inc. / ACT Now! based in Georgia. “HIV patients have no other choice than to take medications regularly to stay healthy. With the rate of newly infected individuals rising nationally, there unfortunately is a steady stream of new drug industry customers, so there is no real incentive to reduce drug prices. Basic business acumen: demand and supply equals big profits. As an advocate, we must remind big pharma to put people first before the politics, profits and process. Its a quality of life issue.”
“We felt it important to bring the message about Merck’s unwarranted high price for Isentress directly to company employees in Merck’s hometown,” said Michael Weinstein, AIDS Healthcare Foundation President. “Many Merck employees will pass our ‘Do the Right Thing!’ signs and placards as they arrive for work. Despite Merck’s efforts to spin it otherwise, Isentress — a single drug that must be taken with at least two other drugs — is the highest priced drug of any first-line AIDS therapy in the U.S. today. And in Africa — where Merck charges $1,100 per patient per year for the drug — it is priced 20 times more than other companies’ AIDS drugs. Merck employees and the public deserve know about the company’s pricing and policies on its AIDS medications.”
As of July 14th, over 8,600 low-income AIDS patients in 13 states have been placed on waiting lists to access lifesaving HIV/AIDS medications through the nation’s network of ADAPs. However, several states have also recently capped further enrollment in their ADAPs or are sharply reducing eligibility for their programs based on a percentage of Federal Poverty Level (FPL) income (in some cases cutting the FPL-eligible income from 400% to 200%), effectively denying needy patients access to medications. But because program enrollment is officially capped — or eligibility eliminated entirely — these additional patients are never formally added to a state’s ADAP waiting list roster.
Background on ADAP
With state budgets stretched thin and increasing numbers of unemployed workers without health insurance, many states have been forced to cap enrollment in their AIDS Drug Assistance Programs. Currently, there are over 8,600 individuals on waiting lists to receive lifesaving AIDS medications in thirteen states. Hundreds of patients in need are being added to the waiting list each week. In addition, thousands more Americans living with HIV/AIDS have been dropped from the program or made ineligible to receive medications through ADAP due to stricter eligibility requirements.
Nationwide, ADAPs serve over 165,000 people, accounting for one third of people on AIDS treatment in the U.S. Unfortunately, the need for these programs expands every year, as more and more people become infected and diagnosed with HIV/AIDS; each year thousands of newly diagnosed HIV patients turn to ADAPs because they cannot afford their medicines.
“The nation’s network of AIDS Drug Assistance Programs face desperate circumstances because of high prices for drugs like Merck’s Isentress,” said Whitney Engeran-Cordova, Senior Director of Public Health Division for AIDS Healthcare Foundation. “AHF is willing to work in partnership with Merck and the other AIDS drug companies toward solutions for ADAP and to create and foster dialogue with the community, but we will not rest and never stop should companies like Merck continue to pursue pricing and policies that conflict with the greater good and health and wellbeing of the public.”
Merck’s Isentress: Salvage Therapy versus First-Line Use
Initially approved in October 2007 by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) as a salvage therapy, the FDA subsequently expanded its approval of Merck’s Isentress for use as a first-line course of treatment in HIV/AIDS, a move which both greatly expanded the U.S. market for the drug and makes Merck’s antiretroviral (ARV) Isentress the most expensive first-line treatment on the market. When it first came to market, Merck set the Average Wholesale Price (AWP) of Isentress at $12,150 per patient yearly. Merck has since raised the AWP of Isentress to $12,895 — a more than 5% price hike — since its introduction to market.
At minimum, Isentress must be taken with at least two other HIV/AIDS drugs as part of an effective antiretroviral treatment regimen, pushing the overall price of one Isentress patient’s yearly AIDS drugs to between $20,000 and $30,000. Public programs (federal and state) are the largest purchaser of ARV medications in the country, with Medicare and Medicaid the single largest payer for HIV/AIDS care in the U.S.
The Department of Health and Human Services treatment guidelines include several preferred treatment options for first-line patients. These options provide the same clinical benefit as Isentress but cost less. For example, Isentress — which must be taken with two additional AIDS drugs — costs nearly as much as an entire three-drug regimen of Viread, Emtriva and Sustiva, commonly combined in Gilead Sciences’ three-in-one tablet, Atripla.
AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF), the largest global AIDS organization, currently provides medical care and services to more than 169,000 individuals in 27 countries worldwide in the U.S., Africa, Latin America/Caribbean the Asia/Pacific region and Eastern Europe. www.aidshealth.org