(Lydia Zuraw/KHN illustration; Getty Images)
This story also ran on Daily Beast. This story can be republished for free (details).
Dozens of patient advocacy groups, like the Bonnie J. Addario Lung Cancer Foundation and the National Coalition for Cancer Survivorship, recently appeared in national advertisements objecting to a Trump administration proposal that could limit drugs covered by Medicare providers.
But a Kaiser Health News analysis found that about half of the groups representing patients have received funding from the pharmaceutical industry.
EXPLORE THE DATABASE
Pre$cription For Power
Investigating the relationships between patient advocacy groups and Big Pharma
Drugmakers funneled more than $58 million to the groups in 2015 alone, according to financial disclosures in KHN’s “Pre$cription for Power” database, which tracks the little-publicized ties between patient advocacy groups and drugmakers. As patient organizations gain ground lobbying Congress and the administration, experts have begun to question whether their financial ties could push them to put drugmakers’ interests ahead of the patients they represent.
The advertisement, which ran in national newspapers, attacked proposed changes to Medicare Part D’s “protected” drug classes, which require that “all or substantially all” drugs must be covered by all insurers. The medicines involved include oral cancer drugs,… Leer más...
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