美国国家公共电台 NPR--Eli Lilly announces price cuts for some insulins later this year

Eli Lilly announces price cuts for some insulins later this year

Transcript¹

Pharmaceutical² giant Eli Lilly is cutting the cost of insulin. NPR's Steve Inskeep asks Stacie Dusetzina of Vanderbilt University Medical Center about the motivation.

STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

Insulin to treat diabetes³ should soon cost less at the drugstore. Eli Lilly, the giant company headquartered in my home state of Indiana, says it is cutting the price and expanding a program that would limit out-of-pocket costs to $35 per month. Some people have been paying a lot more than that. Stacie Dusetzina is a professor of health policy at Vanderbilt University Medical Center and has been following this development. Good morning.

STACIE DUSETZINA: Good morning.

INSKEEP: OK. So somebody gave me this figure that won't surprise you, but it makes my eyes pop out of my head - 7 million Americans rely on insulin. How desperately⁴ do they need it? How much has it been costing them?

DUSETZINA: Well, as you probably have heard, if you've paid any attention to drug pricing hearings that have happened in Congress over the years, there's always someone who has been affected⁵ by the price of insulin, including things like having family members ration⁶ insulin and dying as a result of that activity. So it is a very serious problem for people to not be able to access insulin and to ration insulin, not use it as prescribed. So this is a pretty big deal for people who have struggled to afford to pay for insulin and take it as they need.

INSKEEP: Yeah, and we should be clear, this is, for many people, something that is a lifetime - you have to take it for the rest of your life. It's not a one-time thing.

DUSETZINA: Absolutely.

INSKEEP: Which makes it really significant that over the past 20 years, manufacturers have boosted insulin prices by more than 600%. Was there some real reason that they needed to do that?

DUSETZINA: So I think this gets to a complication between what type of price we think about when we think about the price of insulin. So the price that has gone up is the list price, and that's the price that Lilly has just announced that they're cutting. When we think about what our health plans and our pharmacy⁷ benefits managers pay, they negotiate that price down. So the price hasn't gone up as much for health plans. The problem is - a key problem is that a lot of patients pay based on that list price. So if you're uninsured, you pay that high price. And if you have to pay deductibles or a percentage of your drug's price, you'll pay based on that high list price. So changing the list price is really key here in why this announcement is something that people have really focused on the last...

INSKEEP: OK, this is really helpful. So this is not maybe 7 million people who are suddenly going to pay a lower price. People who had a good health plan were probably not paying all that much to begin with. But people who have lesser⁸ insurance coverage⁹ or no insurance coverage are the people who can really benefit here.

DUSETZINA: That's absolutely right. Many people with commercial health plans have insurance that covers insulin more generously than what's being proposed. So they pay less than $35 a month for their insulin. But uninsured people absolutely will benefit from this once these lower list prices are available for products in pharmacies¹⁰.

INSKEEP: It's easy to say that Eli Lilly then is doing the right thing. But tell me, then, were they doing the wrong thing over the past 20 years as they let the price go up and up and up for the most vulnerable people?

DUSETZINA: I think that that's probably fair. You know, this is a move that they're making, lowering the list price of older insulin products. And it's - these are really products where, because of fierce price negotiation¹¹ between products and with biosimilar options available, they're really not losing much to be able to change the prices now for these products. So while I think they deserve some credit for making this change, I think that they're really gaining a lot from a reputation standpoint, and they're not losing a lot from a revenue standpoint to make the change now.

INSKEEP: Oh, because - I understand. I understand. But very briefly¹², could this lead to the reduction in price for other drugs?

DUSETZINA: It's possible. And in fact, for some of the other insulin products, I have seen that there are calls from senators to lower those prices as well. But I don't think I would assume this would lead to lower prices for other brand-name drugs that aren't older products and aren't in this same competitive situation.

INSKEEP: Stacie Dusetzina with Vanderbilt University Medical Center, thanks for this clarity, appreciate it.

DUSETZINA: Thank you so much.

1 transcript   

n.抄本，誊本，副本，肄业证书

参考例句：

• A transcript of the tapes was presented as evidence in court.一份录音带的文字本作为证据被呈交法庭。
• They wouldn't let me have a transcript of the interview.他们拒绝给我一份采访的文字整理稿。

2 pharmaceutical   

adj.药学的，药物的；药用的，药剂师的

参考例句：

• She has donated money to establish a pharmaceutical laboratory.她捐款成立了一个药剂实验室。
• We are engaged in a legal tussle with a large pharmaceutical company.我们正同一家大制药公司闹法律纠纷。

3 diabetes   

n.糖尿病

参考例句：

• In case of diabetes, physicians advise against the use of sugar.对于糖尿病患者，医生告诫他们不要吃糖。
• Diabetes is caused by a fault in the insulin production of the body.糖尿病是由体內胰岛素分泌失调引起的。

4 desperately   

adv.极度渴望地，绝望地，孤注一掷地

参考例句：

• He was desperately seeking a way to see her again.他正拼命想办法再见她一面。
• He longed desperately to be back at home.他非常渴望回家。

5 affected   

adj.不自然的，假装的

参考例句：

• She showed an affected interest in our subject.她假装对我们的课题感到兴趣。
• His manners are affected.他的态度不自然。

6 ration   

n.定量(pl.)给养，口粮；vt.定量供应

参考例句：

• The country cut the bread ration last year.那个国家去年削减面包配给量。
• We have to ration the water.我们必须限量用水。

7 pharmacy   

n.药房，药剂学，制药业，配药业，一批备用药品

参考例句：

• She works at the pharmacy.她在药房工作。
• Modern pharmacy has solved the problem of sleeplessness.现代制药学已经解决了失眠问题。

8 lesser   

adj.次要的，较小的；adv.较小地，较少地

参考例句：

• Kept some of the lesser players out.不让那些次要的球员参加联赛。
• She has also been affected,but to a lesser degree.她也受到波及，但程度较轻。

9 coverage   

n.报导，保险范围，保险额，范围，覆盖

参考例句：

• There's little coverage of foreign news in the newspaper.报纸上几乎没有国外新闻报道。
• This is an insurance policy with extensive coverage.这是一项承保范围广泛的保险。

10 pharmacies   

药店

参考例句：

• Still, 32 percent of the pharmacies filled the prescriptions. 但仍然有32%的药剂师配发了这两张药方。 来自互联网
• Chinese herbal pharmacies, and traditional massage therapists in the Vancouver telephone book. 中药店，和传统的按摩师在温哥华的电话簿里。 来自互联网

11 negotiation   

n.谈判，协商

参考例句：

• They closed the deal in sugar after a week of negotiation.经过一星期的谈判，他们的食糖生意成交了。
• The negotiation dragged on until July.谈判一直拖到7月份。

12 briefly   

adv.简单地，简短地

参考例句：

• I want to touch briefly on another aspect of the problem.我想简单地谈一下这个问题的另一方面。
• He was kidnapped and briefly detained by a terrorist group.他被一个恐怖组织绑架并短暂拘禁。