Valeant’s pricing ‘greed’
Price for assisted-suicide drugs doubled after rights to it acquired
Valeant Pharmaceuticals, accused by U.S. politicians of price-gouging, is facing criticism from assisted- dying advocates across North America for doubling the price of a drug commonly used to hasten death soon after California legalized doctor-assisted suicide.
The barbiturate, Seconal or secobarbital, isn’t available in Canada, but one Canadian proponent of assisted suicide was harshly critical of the embattled Quebec-based company in a recent interview.
“It’s greed, what else would it be?” said Maureen Taylor, the widow of Ontario microbiologist Donald Low, known for his work on SARS.
Valeant jacked up the price a year ago after purchasing a portfolio of drugs from Marathon Pharmaceuticals. The medication, developed in the 1930s as a sleeping pill, is mainly used for short-term insomnia, epilepsy and pre-operative anesthesia.
Once in the Valeant stable, the price jumped to US$3,000 per 100 capsules, double what it was selling for prior to the company’s acquisition. In 2009, those 100 capsules cost less than US$200.
A full prescription of the pills, diluted in liquid, is needed to cause death.
The company said it doesn’t promote the drug and has sold only about 1,000 prescriptions in the past year. It expects to receive less than US$3 million in sales in 2016.
Other drugs included in the February 2015 Marathon acquisi- tion were Isuprel and Nitropress, two life-saving heart drugs whose prices were tripled or increased six-fold. Valeant was called to defend its pricing strategy during testimony last month before a U.S. congressional committee investigating exorbitant price increases by several industry players.
“Valeant sets prices for drugs based on a number of factors, including the cost of the development or acquisition of a drug, the availability of substitutes or generics, and the benefits it offers versus alternative treatments that might be more costly,” the company said in a statement.
Taylor said her husband, who died in 2013 after suffering from brain cancer, wanted to use the drug to take his own life but couldn’t acquire any and didn’t want to put her in danger of criminal penalty by importing it from the U.S.
Dr. Ellen Wiebe, who helped a Calgary woman with ALS hasten her death, said the orally administered drugs secobarbital and Pentobarbital should be available in Canada at a reasonable cost.
“We have good drugs for the IV but we don’t have good drugs for the oral,” she said from Vancouver.