Windy City Media Group Frontpage News

THE VOICE OF CHICAGO'S GAY, LESBIAN, BI, TRANS AND QUEER COMMUNITY SINCE 1985

home search facebook twitter join
Gay News Sponsor Windy City Times 2023-12-13
DOWNLOAD ISSUE
Donate

Sponsor
Sponsor
Sponsor

  WINDY CITY TIMES

Community Outraged at AIDS Drug Price Increase
by Bob Roehr
2003-12-31

This article shared 4370 times since Wed Dec 31, 2003
facebook twitter google +1 reddit email


Abbott Laboratories quietly increased the price of ritonavir (Norvir) by 400% Dec. 4, from $1.71 to $8.57 per 100 mg pill. The protease inhibitor (PI) primarily is used in sub-therapeutic doses with other protease inhibitors to delay their clearance by the liver. That means the price increase will be felt widely.

The AIDS community has only slowly become aware of the increase and is reacting with outrage and threats of boycott.

The company has asserted that the increase is a long-overdue price adjustment and reflects the cost of past research when they had to reformulate the compound. It also is not increasing the price to state-run AIDS drug assistance programs (ADAPs).

But many observers are calling it a ploy by Abbott to increase the market share of Kaletra, its other protease inhibitor. Kaletra had been losing ground to other PIs that have recently been approved for sale. This would boost the total cost of other PIs that must use Norvir as booster.

Michael Weinstein, president of the AIDS Healthcare Foundation, noted that even while the price of Norvir was skyrocketing, the price of Kaletra, which uses Norvir to boost its potency, did not increase at all.

'This is purely a marketing ploy to push for a larger market share for Kaletra by driving providers and patients to this cheaper Abbot combination therapy,' Weinstein said. 'The HIV community as a whole should unite and speak out against Abbott's bald-faced greed.'

'Abbott is feeding like a vulture on the bones of our healthcare system,' the AIDS Treatment Activists Coalition (ATAC) said in a flyer they are distributing about the price increase (see Web site www.atac-usa.org/Abbott%20Vulture.pdf).

ATAC, in a letter to Abbott dated Dec. 22, noted that tipranavir, a promising PI under development by Boehringer Ingelheim, uses 400 mg of Norvir daily. If the price increase stands and if tipranavir is approved by the FDA, its price would be about $20,000 a year, several times that of other currently available PIs.

'Abbott has changed the landscape of HIV/AIDS for the worse—is this what it wants to be known for?' asked ATAC. 'We believe that it is in the overall interests of your company to reconsider this shameful and destructive path.'

The HIV Medicine Association called on Abbott to rescind the price increase. 'It is critical that the implications of your actions on access to the majority of treatment regimens available to persons living with HIV/AIDS in the U.S. be given paramount consideration,' it wrote in a Dec. 18 letter to Abbott.

'This increase comes at a time when public programs that provide access to HIV treatment are struggling to keep costs down, and numerous ADAPs have been forced to impose eligibility and formulary restrictions and/or waiting lists.'

Howard Grossman, a physician in New York City with a large HIV practice, said in an e-mail he is 'going to refuse to have Abbott reps in my office and will try to find alternatives to any of their drugs I can.' He is asking the American Academy of HIV Medicine, where he serves as chair of the policy committee, to return funding from Abbott.

'To receive academic or financial support from Abbot Laboratories would be an insult to the many patients who this decision so greatly impacts,' Benjamin Young wrote to the company. The HIV doc and clinical instructor of medicine at the University of Colorado has rescinded any offer to lecture on behalf of the company, attend its advisory committee meetings, or support its research projects.

The London-based AIDSmap quoted one pharmaceutical company research scientist as saying, 'This isn't just an attack on competitors' pricing, it's an attack on their research strategies. Why bother investing in these areas if Abbott has effectively priced you out of the market?'

There is an unconfirmed report that the crusading New York Attorney General, Elliot Spitzer, has initiated an investigation into the price increase.

Grapefruit juice and a number of other drugs have an effect similar to Norvir in terms of slowing the liver's clearance of drugs such a PIs. But none of the alternatives have been studied and so there is no data on whether or how they might be substituted. Given Abbott's price increase, that is an area that researchers are likely to give new attention.


This article shared 4370 times since Wed Dec 31, 2003
facebook twitter google +1 reddit email

Out and Aging
Presented By

  ARTICLES YOU MIGHT LIKE

Gay News

HIV criminal laws disproportionately impact Black men in Mississippi 2024-02-21
--From a press release - A new report by the Williams Institute at UCLA School of Law finds that at least 43 people in Mississippi were arrested for HIV-related crimes between 2004 and 2021. Half of all arrests in the state ...


Gay News

'West Side Story' gets a sex-positive spin with new burlesque show 2024-02-19
- In partial observance of National Condom Day, which was Feb. 14, Los Angeles-based AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF) presented A West Side Story Burlesque at the Harris Theater for two hour-long performances on Feb. 17. The show, ...


Gay News

$200,000+ raised at AIDS Foundation Chicago's World of Chocolate Fundraiser to fight HIV/AIDS 2024-02-13
--From a press release - (Chicago, IL) More than 950 guests gathered at Chicago's famed Union Station (500 W. Jackson) for Chicago's Sweetest Fundraiser, AIDS Foundation Chicago's (AFC), World of Chocolate on Friday, February 9. ...


Gay News

Munar prepares to step away from Howard Brown leadership 2024-02-11
- After 10 years of leadership at Howard Brown Health, President and CEO David Ernesto Munar has decided to step down from his post on Feb. 29. Munar, who'd previously been president and CEO of AIDS Foundation ...


Gay News

National Black Justice Coalition commemorates National Black HIV/AIDS Awareness Day 2024-02-07
--From a press release - WASHINGTON — Today, Feb. 7, marks National Black HIV/AIDS Awareness Day (NBHAAD). In commemoration, Dr. David J. Johns, CEO of the National Black Justice Coalition (NBJC), a leading Black LGBTQ+/same-gender ...


Gay News

NATIONAL Wis. report, gender dysphoria, HIV research, Stonewall exhibit, gay CEOs 2024-01-19
- A new annual report from Wisconsin's Office of Children's Mental Health shows that the state's minors—especially girls, children of color and LGBTQ+ youth—continue to struggle with anxiety, depression and thoughts ...


Gay News

WORLD Activist honored, marriages in Estonia, Madrid law, trans sports item 2024-01-05
Video below - The National AIDS Commission (NAC) recently honored Caleb Orozco—a leading figure in the fight for LGBTQ+ rights in Belize—for his instrumental contributions to the national HIV response, BNN reported. According ...


Gay News

SAVOR World of Chocolate, Jaleo and 'Superhot' 2023-12-31
- World of wonder: I am excited to announce that I will be a judge at AIDS Foundation Chicago's World of Chocolate fundraiser! Join me in sampling delicious chocolate from local chefs and help support a great ...


Gay News

PASSAGES Frankie Franklin-Foxx 2023-12-18
- Frankie Franklin-Foxx (born Waverlynn Franklin), a resident of Chicago's North Side, passed away peacefully Dec. 13 at St. Francis Hospital in Evanston. She was 68. Born at Cook County Hospital, Frankie graduated from South Shore High ...


Gay News

NATIONAL Dr. Rachel Levine, World AIDS Day, trans deaths, Philly bar art 2023-12-08
- United States District Court for the Northern District of Alabama Liles C. Burke ruled that emails and other records from U.S. Assistant Secretary for Health Dr. Rachel Levine are relevant to a lawsuit challenging Alabama's ban ...


Gay News

STRUT marks World AIDS Day with 14th Annual Fashion Show 2023-12-05
- On Dec. 3, John Fleming and Madman Productions presented the 14th annual STRUT fashion show at Joe's on Weed Street, 940 W. Weed St. As in previous years, the standing room only show was a fundraiser, ...


Gay News

World AIDS Day commemorated at AIDS Garden Chicago 2023-12-03
- On the rainy morning of Dec. 1, Chicago Parks Foundation and the AIDS Garden Chicago Board of Directors hosted a World AIDS Day commemoration at AIDS Garden Chicago, just south of Belmont Harbor on the Lakefront. ...


Gay News

GLAAD marks World AIDS Day with launch of global resource hub, new HIV report 2023-12-01
--From a press release - New York, New York — Friday, Dec. 1 — GLAAD marked World AIDS Day this year by sharing the results of its fourth annual State of HIV Stigma Report, a national survey among U.S. adults measuring ...


Gay News

Wrightwood 659 to present 'Daniel Goldstein: The Marks We Leave Behind' on World AIDS Day 2023-11-29
- (CHICAGO, Nov. 29, 2023) —Alphawood Exhibitions will present Daniel Goldstein: The Marks We Leave Behind, an exhibition of works from the San Francisco-based artist & HIV/AIDS activist's iconic "Icarian Series," ...


Gay News

WTTW doc chronicles the activism of Danny Sotomayor 2023-11-03
- Practically everything the late Chicago AIDS activist Danny Sotomayor did was "a fight." So says fellow activist Victor Salvo in the new WTTW documentary The Outrage of Danny Sotomayor, which is part of the station's Chicago ...


 


Copyright © 2024 Windy City Media Group. All rights reserved.
Reprint by permission only. PDFs for back issues are downloadable from
our online archives.

Return postage must accompany all manuscripts, drawings, and
photographs submitted if they are to be returned, and no
responsibility may be assumed for unsolicited materials.

All rights to letters, art and photos sent to Nightspots
(Chicago GLBT Nightlife News) and Windy City Times (a Chicago
Gay and Lesbian News and Feature Publication) will be treated
as unconditionally assigned for publication purposes and as such,
subject to editing and comment. The opinions expressed by the
columnists, cartoonists, letter writers, and commentators are
their own and do not necessarily reflect the position of Nightspots
(Chicago GLBT Nightlife News) and Windy City Times (a Chicago Gay,
Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender News and Feature Publication).

The appearance of a name, image or photo of a person or group in
Nightspots (Chicago GLBT Nightlife News) and Windy City Times
(a Chicago Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender News and Feature
Publication) does not indicate the sexual orientation of such
individuals or groups. While we encourage readers to support the
advertisers who make this newspaper possible, Nightspots (Chicago
GLBT Nightlife News) and Windy City Times (a Chicago Gay, Lesbian
News and Feature Publication) cannot accept responsibility for
any advertising claims or promotions.

 
 

TRENDINGBREAKINGPHOTOS







Sponsor


 



Donate


About WCMG      Contact Us      Online Front  Page      Windy City  Times      Nightspots
Identity      BLACKlines      En La Vida      Archives      Advanced Search     
Windy City Queercast      Queercast Archives     
Press  Releases      Join WCMG  Email List      Email Blast      Blogs     
Upcoming Events      Todays Events      Ongoing Events      Bar Guide      Community Groups      In Memoriam     
Privacy Policy     

Windy City Media Group publishes Windy City Times,
The Bi-Weekly Voice of the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Trans Community.
5315 N. Clark St. #192, Chicago, IL 60640-2113 • PH (773) 871-7610 • FAX (773) 871-7609.