Hospitals are facing unprecedented financial challenges in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. One report estimated $53-122 billion of revenue losses for hospitals throughout 2021.i With much of their limited resources spared to COVID-19 response, hospitals faced multiple challenges including surge in demand for healthcare workers, medical supplies and equipment, hospitalization space, and drug shortages, which all lead to higher costs for hospitals. In addition, the long-standing issue of the rising cost of medicines puts financial burden for the overall U.S. healthcare system.
All of these challenges could result in higher burden for patients, preventing them from receiving the optimal quality of care they require. There is much debate about how to improve the efficiency of the healthcare system, but there is no “all-in-one” solution to these challenges.
When first-generation biosimilars were launched in the United States, there was much excitement that biosimilars could be a solution to the rising cost of medicines. But the uptake of biosimilars had been slow for several years. However, more recently launched trastuzumab, bevacizumab, and rituximab biosimilars have captured a significant portion of the market, reaching 60% on average, and several real-world studies indicate the adoption of biosimilars have reduced costs for healthcare systems, in the range of $12.6-$37 billion in the past 10 years.ii,iii Experts view this as an encouraging sign and expect the coming years to be a turning point for biosimilars.