WASHINGTON — A powerful Senate Democrat is asking Pfizer to explain why it hiked the price of its nerve pain drug, Lyrica. And if Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) has his way, more companies will soon be asked to account for their decisions to raise prices.
A bottle of 90 Lyrica pills costs over $650 before rebates and discounts. In 2005, it cost $150, according to Elsevier’s Gold Standard Drug Database.
“The cost of Pfizer’s drug, Lyrica, has grown tremendously over the past several years,” Wyden wrote in a letter sent to Pfizer Tuesday evening, which was first shared with STAT. “In 2016 alone, over 850,000 Medicare beneficiaries were prescribed Lyrica resulting in $2.1 billion Medicare spending. The main cause of this increase has been Pfizer’s consistent and egregious price increases.”
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