HARRISBURG, Pa. — Eli Lilly, one of the nation’s biggest manufacturers of insulin, announced it will reduce the list price of some of its insulins and cap out-of-pocket insulin costs to $35 a month.
The company’s most prescribed insulin, Humalog, and another insulin, Humulin, will cost 70% less beginning around October.
“This is going to make an impact on so many people and give them such a degree of relief,” said Dr. James Dicke, a lead endocrinologist at UPMC Hanover.
Because private insurance and low-income programs like Medicaid already cover a large part of insulin costs, the price cap will have the most impact for those in the middle.
“Folks that have very good insurance, folks that are eligible for medical assistance, or PACE in Pennsylvania, they’re covered. What happens is there are a large amount of folks who fall in between those cracks and those are folks that have high deductibles. They may have high copays,” Dr. Dicke said.
The action follows years of much higher price increases. Humalog’s price, for example, went up more than 1,000% from 1999 to 2019.
Drastic price increases were mirrored at the two other major insulin makers in America, Novo Nordisk and Sanofi. Eli Lilly’s press release announcing the price cuts also called for those companies to follow suit.
When asked for comment, neither company said whether they would also cap insulin costs, but both provided details about their other affordability programs.
The price cap comes amid mounting political pressure from federal and state lawmakers
In Pennsylvania, State Sen. Doug Mastriano (R-Adams) introduced a bill in 2021 to cap insulin costs to $30 a month.
Nationally, the Inflation Reduction Act capped insulin at $35 a month for seniors on Medicare.
President Joe Biden called to expand the cap to all insulin users in his State of the Union Address in January.
“It costs the drug companies roughly $10 a vial to make that insulin. Package it and all, you may get up to $13. But Big Pharma has been unfairly charging people hundreds of dollars—$4- to $500 a month, record profits. Not anymore,” Biden said.
The price of insulin has a far-ranging impact; more than 8.4 million Americans rely on it, according to American Diabetes Association.
Drugs have become so expensive that one in six diabetes patients rations their supplies, according to a Harvard study.
In addition, the price decreases will affect only users of Lilly insulins, who account for 30% of insulin users in the U.S., according to the Lilly press release. Its insulins are first-generation and fast-acting, versus newer, long-acting insulins produced by other companies. However, in April, Lilly is launching a new insulin, Rezvoglar, that is biosimilar to Sanofi’s Lantus.