Guv To Pharma: Drop Drug Prices, Please

Bracing for a federal funding drought and higher state costs for Medicare and Medicaid, Gov. Ned Lamont urged pharma executives to work with Hartford on cutting the cost of prescription drugs Monday morning at a gathering held by the life sciences lobbying group BioCT.

Lamont delivered the remarks in an eight-minute keynote at the group’s annual ​“legislative breakfast,” which this year took place on the ground floor of 100 College St., a 14-story life sciences lab and office tower.

“I need your help when it comes to healthcare and pharmaceutical costs, and I’ll paraphrase you know who: ​‘Ask not what your state can do for you, but what you can do for your state,’” he told the room of about 200 executives and researchers, to some faint laughter. 

The state, he continued, has been doing its part, firing off a six-year streak of budget surpluses, making headway in paying down pension obligations, and gradually shrinking its bonded debt. Despite the overall progress in the economic outlook, the state’s healthcare spending has shot up dramatically in recent years. 

“Most of that is related to hospitalizations, which have gone through the roof, and our Medicaid costs are going up by double digits,” Lamont said. ​“I’m a little worried that what you’re going to see coming out of Washington and the DOGE Commission is really not going to be about efficiency. It’s going to be about cost shifting and shifting healthcare costs, in particular Medicaid costs, right onto the states.” 

Lamont still reiterated his commitment to helping the state’s pharma industry and making Connecticut an attractive enough place for companies who might otherwise be wooed by investors in Silicon Valley, New York, or Boston. He announced that he was meeting the lobby halfway on one of its major legislative agenda pieces, bumping the Research and Development Tax Credit from 70 to 90 percent of liability. (BioCT wanted it to hit 100 percent.)

The governor told the group that he ​“had some ideas in the last session” but didn’t comment further on the future of a stalled bill that he sent to the legislature in February 2024 to establish a Prescription Drug Affordability Board (PDAB), which BioCT opposes. 

As proposed last year, the Board would be incorporated under the state’s Office of Health Strategy and would focus on monitoring drug prices, studying supply chains, and trimming ​“out-of-pocket drug costs to consumers while supporting innovations in biotechnology and scientific discovery.” 

Eleven other states have created similar boards, but BioCT argues in its 2025 public policy and legislative agenda that they ​“have yet to realize any savings to patients.” The brief goes on to say that ​“These PDAB’s lack transparency or expertise to handle and review the complexities of the supply chain which may cause disruption in patient access to treatments and provider reimbursements for medications.” 

In four PDAB-equipped states — Colorado, Maryland, Minnesota, and Washington — the boards have the authority to set ​“upper payment limits” on drugs they’ve reviewed and decided are overpriced. 

According to a press release sent out by BioCT on Monday afternoon, the ​“life sciences business sector” in Connecticut includes 27,000 jobs and contributes ​“nearly $8 billion to the state’s GDP each year.” 

Roughly 760 of those jobs come from New Haven-based Alexion, the AstraZeneca-owned pharma outfit specializing in rare diseases, which sponsored the breakfast at 100 College. The company occupies almost five full floors there and another two floors of mostly lab space at a newly opened complex right across the street at 101 College, for a total of 334,000 square feet. 

Seng Cheng, Alexion’s senior vice president for research and product development, sent an email response to questions from the Independent about the extent to which the company will work with the state on lowering drug prices: ​“Developing good public policy requires dialogue among a wide variety of stakeholders, and today’s breakfast was an example of that kind of exchange in action. Our health care system is highly interconnected and complex, making it incredibly important for all stakeholders to work together.”

Lamont reassured the BioCT crowd that his office would ​“make sure that you guys get a good return on the incredible investments you’re making,” but kept the pressure on the execs to collaborate with the state on reining in prices.

“I gotta tell you, though, we’re serious,” he said. ​“We’ve got to do a better job of getting a handle on that.”