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(Reuters) – The chairman of a House of Representatives committee and another member of the Democratic committee urged Jaguar Health Inc on Monday to reverse recent price increases for a drug that could be used to treat side effects in patients with COVID- 19 and asked Jaguar to provide information on the price increases.
In a letter to Jaguar, Representative Carolyn Maloney, chair of the House of Representatives Oversight and Reform Committee, and Representative Jackie Speier criticized Jaguar for what they said was a nearly three-fold increase in the price of the drug, Mytesi , from $ 688.52 to $ 2,206.52 per bottle of pills, in early April.
They asked Jaguar to provide all communications related to price increases to the Oversight and Reform Committee by May 18.
“We are concerned that the nearly three-fold increase in price imposed by your company … may prevent Americans from accessing Mytesi if its use is approved during the current coronavirus outbreak,” the letter said.
Jaguar did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Mytesi is currently approved for use in the treatment of diarrhea and other gastrointestinal symptoms in patients treated for HIV or AIDS with antiretroviral drugs. In March, Jaguar Health applied for the Emergency Use Authorization (USA) from the US Food and Drug Administration. USA For Mytesi to treat similar symptoms in coronavirus patients, who are also sometimes treated with antiretroviral drugs, which reduce the severity of viral infections.
The FDA rejected the request last month, but Jaguar Health has reportedly been in ongoing talks with the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases about the effectiveness of Mytesi for patients with coronavirus, according to the letter.
“The timing of the Jaguar price increase raises questions about whether this decision was related to the company’s expectation that it could eventually market Mytesi to treat patients with coronavirus,” the letter said.
Mytesi, also called crofelemer, is a botanical drug derived from a substance known as dragon’s blood, which is a resin extracted from the South American tree Croton lechleri.
It was developed through a partnership between Jaguar’s predecessor, Napo Pharmaceuticals and Salix Pharmaceuticals, which later became part of Valeant Pharmaceuticals, a specialized pharmaceutical company that was the subject of federal lawsuits and polls related to its marketing practices.
The association was dissolved in 2016 as a result of a legal agreement that saw treatment rights return to Napo, which then merged with another company to form Jaguar Health.
Gilead Science Inc (GILD.O) remdesivir recently received FDA approval as an antiviral treatment for COVID-19, making it the first drug approved by US regulators to treat the disease, which has infected more than 1 million people in the United States, and killed more than 65,000.
Remdesivir was originally developed as a treatment for the Ebola virus. Other antiviral medications, such as hydroxychloroquine, have been used off-label to treat patients with the coronavirus.
Report by Carl O’Donnell; Editing by Leslie Adler
