Other IRA cases could be influenced by New Jersey judge’s decisions, expert says

A New Jer­sey fed­er­al judge’s skep­ti­cism of drug­mak­ers’ ar­gu­ments against the In­fla­tion Re­duc­tion Act’s drug price ne­go­ti­a­tions could be­come in­flu­en­tial in oth­er courts as phar­ma’s chal­lenges to the law con­tin­ue.

In a joint hear­ing last week, New Jer­sey’s dis­trict court heard a broad range of ar­gu­ments from Bris­tol My­ers Squibb, John­son & John­son, No­var­tis and No­vo Nordisk, in­clud­ing that the ne­go­ti­a­tions are un­con­sti­tu­tion­al, “un­du­ly co­er­cive” and a threat to R&D. The plain­tiffs com­pared the sit­u­a­tion to giv­ing “an arm if they com­plied with the pro­gram’s re­quire­ments or an arm and a leg if they did not.”

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