The “Pharma Bro” Little Piggy is No Exception in The Drug Business

At a hearing in federal court in Brooklyn, Assistant U.S. Attorney Winston Paes said the account contained mostly shares of KaloBios Pharmaceuticals Inc, a drug company that Shkreli briefly ran.

According to the documents, the price hikes at Turing led to skyrocketing patient co-pays – some of which had risen to $16,000.

Three months later, after the acquisition, Shkreli wrote about projections that Daraprim would bring in $375 million a year, after the price of the drug was raised.

Prosecutors say Shkreli misappropriated about $1 million in investors’ money, and used cash from one of his drug companies to cover losses. “Should be a very handsome investment for all of us”.

Chad Griffin, President of the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) issued the following statement: “Turing’s internal memos prove the company put profits over the well-being of patients with life-threatening health conditions and treated the entire controversy as a public relations problem”.

The drugs generated $547 million in revenue and around $351 million in profits past year alone. The documents were released by Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Maryland) before a hearing on Thursday. “They confirm what Americans across the country have experienced firsthand for years – that many drug companies are lining their pockets at the expense of some of the most vulnerable families in our nation”.

Four times the brash entrepreneur and former hedge fund manager – who has been unapologetic about the price hikes, intoned before the committee, “On the advice of counsel I invoke my Fifth amendment privilege against self-incrimination and respectfully decline to answer your question”. Shkreli, who has become the poster child of pharmaceutical-industry greed after hiking the price of an anti-infection drug by…

(AP Photo/Seth Wenig). Former Turing Pharmaceuticals CEO Martin Shkreli arrives at court in New York, Wednesday, Feb. 3, 2016.

Shkreli is out on $5 million bail after being arrested in NY in December on securities-fraud charges unrelated to the price increase.

He said his client never knowingly broke any laws and that the drug-price increase had nothing to do with the criminal case.

The memo said Valeant also used its patient assistance programs “to justify raising prices and to generate increased revenues by driving patients into closed distribution systems”.

When asked about the congressional report, Valeant said it expected that its future growth will be driven more by sales volume than pricing. Turing, meanwhile, increased the price of pyrimethamine (Daraprim), which it had acquired in 2015.

“The documents obtained by the committee demonstrate that Valeant identified goals for revenues first, and then set drug prices to reach those goals”, the memo on Valeant said.