A bipartisan bill introduced last week by two members of the Ohio House of Representatives would cap out-of-pocket costs for insulin and devices used to treat diabetes. The move comes as the Biden administration caps costs for Medicare patients in 2022 and as major manufacturers themselves begin taking steps to lower prices.
invoiceThe bill, co-sponsored by Rep. Munira Abdullahi (D-Columbus) and Rep. Thomas Hall (R-Madison Township), would cap the cost of insulin for all Ohioans at $35 per month. The $100 per month will also cover the cost of related equipment such as test strips, syringes and insulin pumps.
Mr. Hall and Mr. Abdullahi said at a news conference last week that they discovered they had diabetes after watching each other treat each other in the members-only lounge of Parliament House. That’s when they decided to work together to reduce costs.
“The cost of insulin in the U.S. is nearly 10 times the global average,” Abdullahi said, adding that the average price in the U.S. is $99 per month. In Ohio, these costs are borne by approximately 1 million adults with diabetes and their families.
Insulin prices these days seem high for a drug that has been around for more than a century. One reason may be that drug companies sell to a constrained market.
“Before the discovery of insulin in 1921, people with diabetes did not live long. There was not much doctors could do for them,” the American Diabetes Association says on its website. “The most effective treatment has been to put diabetics on very strict diets that minimize carbohydrate intake. This may give patients a few extra years, but it cannot save them. The harsh diet (some were prescribed only 450 calories per day!) sometimes caused patients to starve to death.”
The price of a drug typically falls the longer it remains on the market. Patents expire, generic substitutes are developed, and competition drives down prices.
But as with other areas of the medical field, the concentration of insulin production in a small number of companies may have contributed to the high prices.
“The global insulin market is dominated by three multinational insulin manufacturers: Eli Lilly, Novo Nordisk, and Sanofi, who control 99% of the market by value and 96% of the market by volume. ,” said researchers at the University of Michigan. William H. Herman and Kuo Xichen Written in 2022. “The increasing use of more expensive insulin analogs to replace cheaper human and animal insulins will increase insulin prices and expenditures, reducing the affordability of insulin for health systems and individuals around the world. It’s having a negative impact.”
Also in 2022, Biden signed the Inflation Control Act into law. Limit insulin copays to $35 per month for Medicare patients.that was the first ever-growing list of drugs Biden is trying to use the bargaining power of America’s senior health care program to lower prices.
Major insulin producers may have seen the writing on the wall.
Last March, Eli Lilly announces The company announced it is capping out-of-pocket costs for insulin products at $35 per month. Three months later, Sanofi announces That it would do the same thing. Novo Nordisk announces A unique price reduction that was scheduled to begin in January.
The measure introduced by Hall and Abdullahi attracted more than 20 co-sponsors. Abdullahi said he doesn’t plan to stop there.
“This is just the first step in the process of making health care fairer and more affordable for all Ohioans,” she said.
Get the morning headlines delivered to your inbox
