Policy

While many industry players and observers have high hopes for the EPIC Act, some say budgetary headwinds could make it difficult for the current administration to make meaningful repeals or amendments to the IRA.

Price-negotiation provisions that are out of step with reality are discouraging funders and Big Pharma partners from investing in potentially transformative therapies. Fixing some of the unintended consequences of the IRA will clear the way for innovative medicines to reach patients in need.

President Trump also refused to promise pharma execs that he would hamstring the IRA’s drug negotiation program.

The meeting, which will include Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla as the newly named board of directors’ chair, will reportedly cover key topics for the lobbying group, including the Inflation Reduction Act.

Morale is low at the FDA, which was hit with layoffs this week following RFK Jr.’s confirmation. Biopharma leaders and agency insiders fear further workforce cuts could delay new medicines.

The hammer came down on an unspecified number of FDA employees this weekend, days after Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was confirmed as HHS Secretary.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr.—whose history of anti-vaccine rhetoric has had the healthcare and biopharma industries on edge—was confirmed as Health and Human Services Secretary in a Senate vote along party lines.

As the Q4 2024 pharma earnings period rolls on through the first month of President Donald Trump’s second term, executives find themselves faced with policy questions ranging from the Inflation Reduction Act to RFK Jr.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s HHS nomination moves to a full Senate vote; Donald Trump’s tariff war sparks China-related concerns for biopharma; Pfizer, Merck and more announce Q4 and 2024 earnings; and the non-opioid painkiller space heats up as FDA approves Vertex’s Jounavx.

J&J, AstraZeneca, Novo Nordisk and Roche are among the companies that might take a hit from the soon-to-be-enacted fees, according to analysts.