Roche May Sell Drugs Directly in US to Bypass Middlemen

(Bloomberg) — Roche Holding AG is weighing direct-to-patient drug sales in the US, bypassing the middleman for its pricey medicines for multiple sclerosis, eye disease and cancer.

The Swiss drugmaker has discussed direct-to-patient sales with the US government, Chief Executive Officer Thomas Schinecker said on Thursday as the company reported earnings. The move would bring down costs “quite quickly,” he said.

A push into direct selling would echo recent moves by Pfizer Inc., Eli Lilly & Co. and Novo Nordisk A/S, which have all begun selling medicines via telehealth.

“Something has to be done here to take out these people that are just trying to make money,” Schinecker said. He cited the example of multiple sclerosis drug Ocrevus, which he said had been hit with surcharges even after Roche had priced it below competing therapies.

Direct sales circumvent players like pharmacy benefit managers that drugmakers say reduce their revenue and hurt patient access. Roche shares rose as much as 2.9% in Zurich trading after Schinecker’s comments and the company’s better-than-expected profit report. 

The US has a complex system in which PBMs are the intermediary between companies, insurers and pharmacies, resulting in drug prices that are some of the highest in the world. President Donald Trump earlier this year signed an executive order calling on the industry to cut costs to the lowest level paid by similar countries. Part of the proposal instructed the US Department of Health and Human Services to help Americans directly buy their medicine at those lower prices. 

“As a pharmaceutical company you have to take a lot of risk if you want to develop a new medicine, and I think it’s just not OK that so called middlemen take 50% of the profit,” Schinecker told Bloomberg TV. “So if the United States wants to reduce prices, let us go direct, and we can cut out 50% off prices. And we can do that across the portfolio.” 

Roche has proposed demonstration projects to the US government that would show how a direct-to-consumer model could work, Schinecker said in an interview. He declined to identify which drugs would be included in such a demo, citing the ongoing talks.

Roche’s earnings excluding some items climbed 8% to 11.08 Swiss francs ($13.98) a share in the first half, beating estimates, powered by Ocrevus as well as medicines for asthma and eye disease.

Roche has promised a series of drug trial readouts from its experimental pipeline this year that will shape its competitiveness into the future. Results so far have been mixed, with one large study in smokers’ cough failing this week. 

The drugmaker on Thursday didn’t raise its forecast for the year, in part due to the geopolitical uncertainty, according to the CEO. Earnings per share excluding some items will likely grow in the high single-digit range at constant currencies, it said, with sales rising in the mid single-digit range. 

–With assistance from Anna Edwards and Guy Johnson.

(Updates with interview comment in eighth paragraph. An earlier version corrected the CEO’s title in caption to television interview clip)

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