Remicade Helped By “Slow Start” To Medicare Part B Demo
This article was originally published in The Pink Sheet Daily
Executive Summary
Johnson & Johnson's rheumatoid arthritis therapy Remicade is feeling virtually no impact from a Medicare demonstration project that provides coverage to competing agents, Group Chairman-Biopharmaceuticals Joe Scodari said during the Bear Stearns health care conference in New York Sept. 13
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Johnson & Johnson's rheumatoid arthritis therapy Remicade is feeling virtually no impact from a Medicare demonstration project that provides coverage to competing agents, Group Chairman-Biopharmaceuticals Joe Scodari said during the Bear Stearns health care conference in New York Sept. 13. J&J did not "predict any major impact from that program" because it involves relatively limited funding for a large number of potential products, Scodari noted. "That somewhat minor impact is now being further diluted because it has been somewhat slow in getting up and running," Scodari noted. Under the Part B demonstration project, Medicare is authorized to spend $500 mil. on up to 50,000 beneficiaries for coverage of self-administered drugs used as "replacement therapy" for covered Part B drugs. The self-administered products will be covered for the full Medicare population beginning in 2006. In the RA category, both Wyeth/Amgen's Enbrel and Abbott's Humira are eligible for coverage. The demonstration project started several months late, and so far has enrolled fewer than 4,000 beneficiaries (1 (Also see "Medicare Part B Average Sales Prices Will Be Published In December – CMS" - Pink Sheet, 8 Sep, 2004.)). - Michael McCaughan |