May 11 (Portal) – Albert Bourla, chief executive officer of Pfizer Inc (PFE.N), has described US plans to negotiate drug prices for its Medicare health program as “negotiations with a gun to the head” and said he expects that drug makers are suing to stop them the process.
“It’s not a matter of negotiations at all. It’s about setting prices,” Bourla said at a Portal news event on Thursday, referring to the drug pricing reform signed by the Biden administration, which is part of the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA). The law aims to save $25 billion through price negotiations by 2031 for Americans, who pay more for drugs than any other country.
The pharmaceutical industry expects the law, passed last year, to result in a hit to profits that will force drugmakers to pull back from developing breakthrough new treatments.
As Portal reported earlier this week, the companies have started laying the groundwork to fight the US plan.
“I think there will be legal action,” he said, adding that he wasn’t sure that would stop the plan before the new prices go into effect in 2026. Bourla said he’s also not optimistic that Congress will take action to change the pricing law.
Drugs likely to be among the first to be discussed include Pfizer’s breast cancer drug Ibrance and blood thinner Eliquis, which Pfizer shares with Bristol Myers Squibb (BMY.N).
Bourla acknowledged some positive aspects of the law for patients, such as lower drug co-payments.
Officials at the US Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which will oversee drug pricing talks, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Bourla wants to shift Pfizer’s focus away from the COVID-19 vaccines and treatments that have put the company at the forefront of the pandemic response and resulted in a one-time sales surge.
The company is in the midst of a sharp but expected decline in COVID product sales and is also bracing for declining revenue in the coming years for some of its best-selling drugs as they face cheap generic competition.
As a result, investors expect Pfizer to produce new blockbuster drugs that can rake in billions each year, either from the company’s pipeline of development drugs or through deals.
Bourla led Pfizer when the New York-based drugmaker participated in the development of a vaccine against COVID along with German partner BioNTech (22UAy.DE) as much of the world went into lockdown in 2020. The company also developed Paxlovid, a life-saving antiviral treatment for disease.
The COVID products pushed Pfizer’s sales to record levels, exceeding $100 billion in 2022 and $80 billion in 2021.
“Pfizer is spending all of the profits we made in 21 and 22 from COVID and those we will make in 2023 on acquiring technologies and products that we believe will help us fight cancer” , he said, describing the effort as the drugmaker’s “Next moonshot.”
“NOT ABOUT ABORTION PILLS”
Bourla has overseen a number of acquisitions to strengthen Pfizer’s drug pipeline, most notably the $43 billion deal for Seagen, which makes complex targeted cancer therapies.
The drugmaker also spent billions to buy migraine drug maker Biohaven Pharmaceutical, ulcerative colitis drug developer Arena Pharmaceuticals and Global Blood Therapeutics, maker of a drug used to treat sickle cell disease.
Bourla said he expects to close only modest-sized deals in the near term as he focuses on the Seagen integration.
As the company works to develop new drugs, Bourla raised concerns about a recent ruling by a Texas judge that suspended the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s approval of the abortion pill mifepristone in 2000. The US Supreme Court has shelved that order, leaving the drug, which is used in more than half of US abortions, on the market pending an appeal of the case.
Bourla signed an open letter from hundreds of industry executives asking the Supreme Court to overturn the Texas judge’s decision. On Thursday, he called the FDA “the most well-known regulator in the world” and said citizens can trust regulators to have done the work to confirm whether drugs are safe.
“This isn’t about abortion pills … This is about a judge’s ability to say if a drug is safe and effective,” Bourla said. “It undermines the entire trust system.”
Reporting by Michael Erman in New York; Edited by Bill Berkrot
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