Mylan Pharmaceuticals recently reinvigorated the public outcry over pharmaceutical price increases when news surfaced that the company had raised the price of EpiPens by more than 500% over the past decade and, purportedly, had plans to increase the price even more. The Mylan controversy comes on the heels of several notorious pricing scandals last year. Recall Valeant Pharmaceuticals, which acquired cardiac drugs Isuprel and Nitropress and then quickly raised their prices by 525 percent and 212 percent, respectively. And of course, who can forget Martin Shkreli of Turing Pharmaceuticals, who increased the price of toxoplasmosis treatment Daraprim by 5,000 percent and then claimed he should have raised the price even higher.
However, one company, pharmaceutical giant Allergan, seems to be taking a different approach to pricing. Last week, Allergan CEO Brent Saunders condemned the scandalous pricing increases that have raised suspicions of drug companies and placed the entire industry in the political hot seat. In an entry on the company's blog, Saunders issued Allergan's “social contract with patients” that made several drug pricing commitments to its customers.
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