Trump wants to buy Greenland and we live in a simulation
1. Johnson & Johnson Opioid Ruling
That’s painful. (get it?…I’ll see myself out)
This afternoon, a judge released the verdict (paywall – WSJ) of the first of many trials determining whether Johnson & Johnson specifically contributed to the Oklahoma opioid crisis. The state of Oklahoma asked for as much as $17 billion in fines from J&J, claiming it would cost that much to recover from the damage done.
While the judge found J&J liable, the fine was set at $572 million, which is about 3% of what Oklahoma asked for. And of course, since the fine for Johnson & Johnson wasn’t as big as expected, the stock shot up around 3% immediately after the news broke. The company will appeal the decision, too.
That’s not all.
This court case is the second of many trials taking place around the U.S: Purdue Pharma settled for $270 million, and Teva Pharmaceuticals settled for $85 million, also in Oklahoma. We’ll probably be seeing some more drug makers coughing up big bucks here before too long.
After all, there are almost 2,000 opioid related lawsuits out there right now, and almost all of them have consolidated around a federal court house in Ohio. Keep an eye on that case, which is slated for October.
2. Cue up the next blockbuster drug deal – Amgen is buying Otezla in $13.4 billy deal
In Monday’s other inflamed news story…
Amgen announced their plans Monday to buy the highly successful, lucrative anti-inflammatory drug Otezla from Celgene for a whopping $13.4 billion deal (keep in mind that Celgene is getting acquired by Bristol-Myers-Squibb).
A Win-Win Deal.
As the WSJ points out, this deal was pretty much a huge win for BMY since the drug maker was required by the FTC to sell Otezla anyway. Amgen is a fan of the deal too, since patents on the blockbuster drug don’t expire until 2028. It’s the latest deal in the usually highly active biotech space, which hasn’t been too active since January of this year.
3. Apple’s Health division faces personnel challenges
Secret’s out.
Tensions are rising inside Apple’s health division personnel. The highly secretive health operation has seen executives departing for other healthcare firms and ventures after growing frustrated with Apple’s progress in disrupting healthcare along with its various healthcare philosophies.
Apparently, while Apple is focusing more on bigger picture, general population health and incremental progress, individuals were hoping to solve more specific problems within healthcare at a quicker pace with more focus. That issue, coupled with more philosophical problems, led to the departure of quite a few employees.
My thoughts..
I’m all for the ambition, but the healthcare industry as a whole moves as slow as molasses to adopt any new technology AS IS. Some practices still transfer data via fax. I’ve even heard of one physician who had no clue what Microsoft Excel was. (FYI – the CNBC article linked above also has some interesting insights into Apple Health’s operations and structure, if you’re into that sort of thing).
In other Apple healthcare news…
The tech giant just announced a strategic partnership between Allscripts and Apple Health Records. According to the release, Allscripts will now let any patient using the platform access their personal healthcare data via iPhone – even if using several providers.
4. Higher temperatures create more health problems
Sticky.
As if you haven’t heard enough about climate change, NPR published an article this week highlighting the negative health effects that come along with rising temperatures. The story details how health problems and mortalities rose drastically during summer heat waves in various cities.
Don’t forget though, that some may stand to gain from rising temperatures. Since diseases spread more easily in higher heat environments, Axios pointed out in January that warming global temperatures could be a huge boon to Big Pharma and drug development/sales to counteract the potentially higher occurrence of diseases if temperatures continue to rise.
5. Healthcare Policy Corner
Widespread critics are speaking out against the administration’s Public Charge Rule expected to take effect in October.
What’s the Public Charge Rule?
Basically, the administration is looking for more ways to control immigration. As a way to deny people from receiving green cards, the admin created a rule that limits immigrants from receiving public benefits for more than 12 months.
For instance, if said immigrant were to use Medicaid, which is a designated public benefit under the Public Charge Rule, for more than 12 months within a 36 month period, that individual would then be denied a green card.
How does this affect healthcare?
Since Medicaid is listed as one of the public benefits, healthcare providers (including the AHA) and state officials alike have warned the admin, saying that Medicaid enrollees would plummet as a result of the rule.
Lower levels of Medicaid enrollees would lead to higher percentages of un-insured populations, which means providers would potentially be faced with much higher levels of uncompensated care, worse health outcomes in their population, and worse financial outcomes that they and the state would eventually have to pay for, anyway.
As you can imagine, several states are suing and we’ll see where all of this ends up.
In other policy news…
Democratic Senators aren’t fans of Medicare for All policies. Instead, according to Politico, both representatives in battleground states and incumbents alike favor supporting the healthcare rhetoric already floating around: expansion of Medicaid at the state levels, and adding public insurance options to states. But they’re shying away big-time from touting Medicare for All.
Quick Hits
Biz Hits
- Addus Homecare is buying Hospice Partners of America in Birmingham, Alabama for $130 million.
- Private equity firms are looking to buy a stake in a….Philippine hospital system?
- In an interesting development, Cigna is looking to get rid of its group life business and might join the providers purchasing party
- I haven’t seen much reported on either of these, but Centene and Aetna are potentially losing huge Managed Medicaid
- Contracts (like, in the order of $1 billion) in Louisiana and Kansas.
State Hits
- Wyoming is trying to lower air ambulance costs by forcing lower-than-Medicare payments and designating it as a public utility
- Texas’ surprise billing legislation completely left out employer-sponsored (teachers, state employees, etc.) insurance – about 9 million folks
- Florida just re-defined a CRNA’s scope of practice, saying that a CRNA “is an anesthesiologist”
- In other Florida news, non-competes are about to get a lot harder to enforce.
- Hospitals are suing the state of Alaska as the governor sharpens his pencil to sign significant Medicaid cuts into law.
- Here’s a state-by-state breakdown of 113 recent rural hospital closures, from Beckers.
- Should hospitals purchase marketing on local football stadiums? A children’s hospital in Texas did, and Dallas News had some sharp words to say about it.
Other Hits
- A Price Transparency Case Study: patients shop for lower healthcare prices if reference pricing is included
- The CDC just flagged 1 death and 200 cases of lung illnesses in the U.S. tied to VAPING.
- When a rural hospital shuts down, how do people get emergency care?
My Favorite Reads This Week
How the Invention of Spreadsheet Software Unleashed Wall Street on the World
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