Marathon Pharmaceuticals to Charge $89,000 for Muscular Dystrophy Drug
Marathon Pharmaceuticals LLC says it will charge $89,000 annually in the U.S. for a decades-old steroidal drug that was approved for U.S. sale for the first time on Thursday, a price that is as much as 70 times higher than drug’s price overseas.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved the drug, called deflazacort, on Thursday to treat a rare type of muscular dystrophy that affects some 12,000 boys in the U.S., most of whom die in their 20s and 30s. The drug isn’t a cure, but it has been shown to improve muscle strength compared with a placebo, the FDA said in a statement announcing the approval.
The drug hasn’t been sold in the U.S. previously, mainly because no company thought it would be profitable enough to warrant the effort of seeking FDA approval. But U.S. patients have been importing it from foreign countries since the 1990s after clinical trials showed its potential to reduce inflammation with fewer side effects than another steroid.
The price set by Marathon, based in Northbrook, Ill., is 50 to 70 times what most U.S. patients now pay to buy deflazacort from an online pharmacy in the United Kingdom, according to advocates for patients with Duchenne muscular dystrophy.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/marathon-pharmaceuticals-to-charge-dollar89000-for-muscular-dystrophy-drug/ar-AAmO5wW?li=BBnb7Kz
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