Leading researchers at Tufts University School of Medicine’s Center for the Evaluation of Value and Risk in Health (CEVR) have published a commentary regarding value-based healthcare and using a health technology assessment (HTA) to regulate drug prices. Authors Peter Neumann, Daniel Ollendorf, and Joshua Cohen, also discuss the effects of regulatory delays on lower drug prices via manufacturer competition, the use of biosimilars and generics, and getting around pharmaceutical benefits managers (PBMs).
The authors remark, “The critical question is not how we can keep drug prices down. The important question is: what is a reasonable price for each drug? Paying too high a price diverts resources from better uses elsewhere. Paying too little fails to send industry suitable signals to incentivize the development of new drugs,” adding, “The right price corresponds to value, measured appropriately… We are living in a time of remarkable scientific breakthroughs, but these advances come at a cost. In the end, paying value-based prices, even as we strive to promote access to health care, makes sense because it helps ensure that drug companies produce more of what people want—products that improve people’s health—while considering society’s other pressing priorities.” Read the article here.
(Source: Neumann et al., Health Services Research, 6/3/21)
