NEW YORK, Jan 2 (Reuters): Drugmakers plan to raise US prices on at least 350 branded medications including vaccines against COVID, RSV and shingles and blockbuster cancer treatment Ibrance, even as the Trump administration pressures them for cuts, according to data provided exclusively by healthcare research firm 3 Axis Advisors.
The number of price increases for 2026 is up from the same point last year, when drugmakers unveiled plans for raises on more than 250 drugs. The median of this year's price hikes is around 4 per cent - in line with 2025.
The increases do not reflect any rebates to pharmacy benefit managers and other discounts.
Drugmakers also plan to cut the list prices on around nine drugs. That includes a more than 40 per cent cut for Boehringer Ingelheim's diabetes drug Jardiance and three related treatments.
Boehringer Ingelheim and Eli Lilly, which sell Jardiance together, did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the reason for the price cuts.
Jardiance is among the 10 drugs for which the US government negotiated a lower price for the Medicare program for people aged 65 and older in 2026. Under those negotiations, Boehringer and Lilly slashed the Jardiance price by two-thirds.
US patients currently pay by far the most for prescription medicines, often nearly three times more than in other developed nations, and Trump has been pressuring drugmakers to lower their prices to what patients pay in similarly wealthy nations.
The increases on 350 medicines come even as Trump has struck deals with 14 drugmakers on prices of some of their medicines for the government's Medicaid program for low-income Americans and for cash payers. Pfizer, Sanofi, Boehringer Ingelheim, Novartis and GSK are among those companies and also plan to raise prices on some drugs on January 1.
"These deals are being announced as transformative when, in fact, they really just nibble around the margins in terms of what is really driving high prices for prescription drugs in the US," said Dr. Benjamin Rome, a health policy researcher at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston.
Rome said the companies seem to be maximizing prices while negotiating discounts behind the scenes with health and drug insurers and then setting yet another price for direct-to-consumer cash-pay sales.
An HHS spokesman declined to comment.
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