Drug chiefs in Senate strike conciliatory note over prices

In Washington DC on Tuesday, the chief executives of half a dozen leading drugmakers defended the industry’s drug pricing rationale and shifted the blame for high prices onto the sector’s intermediaries.

AbbVie CEO Richard Gonzalez was challenged over a more than-doubling of the price of anti-TNF super-blockbuster Humira (adalimumab) in the sunset years of its patent estate.

Defending the approach, he noted the therapy “plays a very important role in AbbVie's overall funding of R&D,” while senators acknowledged a balance between affordability and the need to pay for innovation.