Trump Announces Drug Price Deals with Nine Pharma Firms

President Donald Trump announced agreements on Friday with nine major pharmaceutical companies to reduce prices on certain drugs sold to the Medicaid program and directly to consumers, as part of an ongoing effort to bring U.S. prescription costs in line with those in other developed nations.

The deals involve Bristol Myers Squibb, Gilead Sciences, Merck, Roche's U.S. unit Genentech, Novartis, Amgen, Boehringer Ingelheim, Sanofi and GlaxoSmithKline. Under the arrangements, the companies will apply most-favored-nation pricing to most of their drugs covered by Medicaid, the government program for low-income individuals, ensuring costs do not exceed those charged in other wealthy countries. Senior administration officials described the agreements as promising substantial savings on widely used medications, though specific figures were not provided.

This marks the largest such announcement to date, bringing the total number of companies reaching voluntary pacts with the administration to 14 out of 17 targeted in letters sent by Trump in July. Those earlier missives urged drugmakers to extend international pricing to Medicaid and to launch new medicines in the U.S. at rates no higher...