Price decreases for widely used generic drugs slow in 2017 after two years of substantial price drops
- Collection:
- Health Policy and Services Research
- Series Title(s):
- Rx price watch
- Author(s):
- Schondelmeyer, Stephen W., author Purvis, Leigh, author
- Contributor(s):
- AARP (Organization), issuing body. Public Policy Institute (AARP (Organization)), issuing body.
- Publication:
- Washington, DC : AARP Public Policy Institute, April 2019
- Language(s):
- English
- Format:
- Text
- Subject(s):
- Drug Costs -- trends Drugs, Generic -- economics Prescription Drugs -- economics United States
- Genre(s):
- Technical Report
- Abstract:
- (1) Generic drugs have long been a means of helping consumers and payers reduce prescription drug costs, currently accounting for nearly 90 percent of all retail prescriptions filled in the United States. (2) In 2017, retail prices for 360 widely used generic prescription drugs fell by an average of 9.3 percent. In contrast, the general inflation rate was 2.1 percent over the same period. (a) This followed two consecutive years (2015 and 2016) of substantial generic drug prices decreases; the previous two consecutive years (2013 and 2014) saw increase in generic drug prices. (3) All but three of the 390 generic prescription drug products in the study's market basket had a retail price change in 2017. (a) 297 Drug products (76 percent) experience a price decrease, and the remaining 90 (23 percent) experienced a price increase. (4) The average annual cost for a generic medication used on a chronic basis was $365 in 2017. On average, older Americans take 4.5 prescription drugs every month. Consequently, older adults who use generic prescription drugs are likely to have experienced an average annual retail cost of drug therapy of $1642 in 2017. (a) This amount is roughly 6 percent of the median income of Medicare beneficiaries. (5) In 2017, the average annual price of therapy for widely used brand name prescription drugs was more than 18 times higher than the average annual price of therapy for generic prescription drugs ($6798 v. $365, respectively). In 2013, the price differential between these same market baskets was substantially smaller ($4308 v. $751, respectively). (6) The availability of economically competitive and lower-cost generic drugs will take on added importance as more brand name drugs and biologicals enter the market with unusually high prices.
- Copyright:
- Reproduced with permission of the copyright holder. Further use of the material is subject to CC BY-NC-ND license. (More information)
- Extent:
- 1 online resource (1 PDF file (2 pages))
- Illustrations:
- Illustrations
- NLM Unique ID:
- 101769449 (See catalog record)
- Permanent Link:
- http://resource.nlm.nih.gov/101769449