Judge upholds Medicare drug price negotiation program, but more lawsuits are being considered in other courts

Medicare’s historic drug price negotiation program has survived its first court challenge by a drugmaker.

A federal district court judge in Delaware on Friday rejected AstraZeneca’s claims that the negotiation program was unconstitutional and deprived the pharmaceutical company of its protected property interest.

AstraZeneca’s Farxiga drug, which treats chronic kidney disease, heart failure and Type 2 diabetes, was among the 10 medications selected last year for the initial round of price negotiations with Medicare. The effort was authorized by the Inflation Reduction Act, which Democrats pushed through Congress in 2022.

The drugmakers countered, filing multiple lawsuits across the country that argued the negotiation program violated the US Constitution in a variety of ways.

Chief Judge Colm Connolly, who was appointed by former President Donald Trump, said that the property interest AstraZeneca claims should be protected under the Fifth Amendment is its ability to sell its drugs at prices higher than the maximum amounts established by the Inflation Reduction Act.

“No one, however, is entitled to sell the Government drugs at prices the Government won’t agree to pay,” Connolly wrote in his ruling, noting that drugmakers’ participation in Medicare and the negotiation program are voluntary.

“The whole point of the Program is to lower the prices of selected drugs that lack generic competition and account for a disproportionate share of Medicare’s expenses,” Connolly wrote. “Understandably, drug manufacturers like AstraZeneca don’t like the IRA. Lower prices mean lower profits. Drug manufacturers like AstraZeneca desire the old pricing regime, and they lobbied and perhaps expected Congress not to pass the IRA in 2022.”

Connolly also…