![Police with man in handcuffs](https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/police_handcuffs_crime.jpg?quality=75&w=500)
![Police with man in handcuffs](https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/police_handcuffs_crime.jpg?quality=75&w=500)
2:00 pm EDT - 4:15 pm EDT
Past Event
2:00 pm - 4:15 pm EDT
1775 Massachusetts Avenue N.W.
Washington, DC
20036
The high cost of prescription drugs has become an increasingly pressing concern for policymakers, insurers, and families. New drugs—like those now available for hepatitis C— offer tremendous medical benefits, but at a cost that puts them out of reach for many patients. In an effort to address the affordability dilemma, the Louisiana Department of Health has recently introduced a novel “subscription” model under which Asegua Therapeutics, a subsidiary of Gilead Sciences, will supply, for a negotiated sum, enough hepatitis C drugs to cure virtually all incarcerated and Medicaid patients suffering from hepatitis C in Louisiana over the next five years.
On Monday, July 22, the Brookings Institution’s Hutchins Center on Fiscal & Monetary Policy and the USC-Brookings Schaeffer Initiative for Health Policy co-hosted a discussion of the Louisiana experiment as well as other novel approaches to increasing prescription drug affordability. Featured speakers included Louisiana Secretary of Health Rebekah Gee and Wendell Primus, senior advisor to Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, whose office is currently working on legislation to lower prescription drug prices.
Moderator
Moderator
Panelist
Moderator
Stuart M. Butler
August 23, 2024
Caren Grown, Junjie Ren
August 19, 2024
Homi Kharas
August 14, 2024