Turing Pharmaceuticals will offer its $750-a-pill generic drug Daraprim at a 50 percent discount, but won’t change the list price of the anti-parasite treatment despite public outcry.
Turing and its CEO Martin Shkreli created a massive public backlash earlier this fall when the company hiked the price of Daraprim from $13.50 to $750 a pill. The treatment has been on the market for decades.
The $750 price will remain, but Turing said in a statement Tuesday that it will offer discounts of up to 50 percent on that price for hospitals. The company said hospitals are the first to treat about 80 percent of the patients with toxoplasmosis encephalitis, the most common form of toxoplasmosis, which is the condition treated by Daraprim.
The company said it will participate in federal and state programs such as Medicaid and Section 340B. It also said it will work with patients with commercial insurance to ensure their out-of-pocket obligation will be no more than $10 per prescription, a press release reads.
The release comes about a week after Turing announced its third-quarter financial results, where the company lost $15 million over the past three months.
Advocates aren’t too happy about the announcement, saying that even after discounts Daraprim is still $375 a pill.
“After increasing the price of Daraprim by 5,000 percent, he now proposes to gouge critically ill people upwards of $375 for a drug that used to cost just a few dollars,” said Chad Griffin, head of the Human Rights Council, in a blog post earlier this week after initial reports of a discount surfaced. The council noted that AIDS patients often use the drug as their weakened immune systems make them more susceptible to the parasite.
Shkreli’s price hike back in September caught the attention of several Democratic presidential candidates. Front-runner Hillary Clinton said Shkreli was engaging in price gouging.
Clinton, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders and former Maryland governor Martin O’Malley have all issued plans to take on high drug prices.
