Pharmaceutical giant Pfizer said Thursday that it would double the income threshold for patients to be eligible for financial assistance in response to an increasing number of consumers finding it difficult to afford their prescription medicines.
The change would allow single patients earning up to four times the federal poverty level, or $47,080, or a family of four with household income of up to $97,000 to receive more than 40 different drugs for free through its RxPathways program.
The company said there's been a shift in who requests financial help over the past year.
“In the past, I would say the majority of people who contacted us had no insurance,” said Gary Pelletier, executive director of the Pfizer Patient Assistance Foundation. “We have seen...more people calling in who do have some insurance but not enough.”
Pelletier estimated extending income eligibility could serve an additional 200,000 patients. He said the program helped around 350,000 in 2014. Between 2010 and 2014, as many as 2.5 million people on RxPathways got access to more than 30 million prescriptions. Pfizer's additional cost incurred by these new guidelines was not immediately available.
The move comes at a time of increased scrutiny on the entire pharmaceutical industry. New, more expensive specialty drugs are contributing to an overall rise in spending on medicines.
A prime example of the trend has been the steady rise in the cost of cancer drugs. A March study published in Mayo Clinic Proceedings found the average price for a year of cancer drug treatment had increased from about $10,000 in 2000 to more than $100,000 by 2012, while average household income decreased by 8% during that period.
Drug makers have come under increased scrutiny by critics who demand light be shed on the cost to research and develop a new drug, a primary reason the industry often gives to explain the skyrocketing prices of new therapies.
Pelletier insists that the decision to expand eligibility of its assistance program was not a direct response to criticisms of companies such as Gilead Sciences and its $84,000 Hepatitis C treatment Sovaldi. Public backlash over drug prices has only intensified over the past year as drug makers such as Turing Pharmaceuticals and Valeant Pharmaceuticals have been accused of price gouging after hiking the price of older, generic drugs by several hundred percent.
Similar to other drug companies, Pfizer has for years offered medications at discounted prices both to insurers and directly to consumers, as well as provided insurance counseling and co-pay cards.
Despite such help, Pelletier acknowledged that any financial assistance provided by a drug company offers only temporary relief until patients can obtain suitable coverage.
“I think it would be great if more people could get insurance, and for co-pays and more cost-sharing agreements to remain affordable for patients,” Pelletier said.
Many have said a more permanent solution to the problem of drug prices would be for pharmaceutical companies to simply lower the listed prices of their products. But Pelletier said doing so would not eliminate patients' long-term needs.
