Results show that beliefs about biosimilars are mixed
Forty biosimilars have been approved by the FDA and 27 have come on the market, according to our colleagues at the Center for Biosimilars®. Industry experts have been eyeing 2023 as a crucial year for biosimilars because as many as 10 biosimilars to Humira (adalimumab) are expected to come on the market, most during the second half of the year.
But results of the 2023 Annual Managed Healthcare Executive Pharmacy Survey show about skepticism and optimism about what the biosimilar can accomplish and fulfilling their reason-to-be, lowering the price of biologics through competition.
Forty percent of the 311 respondents indicated that they believe that makers of reference drugs will find ways to keep biosimilars from gaining market share.
Roughly the same proportion — 39% — indicated that they see biosimilars as “beginning to deliver on their promise” of creating price competition.
The survey also asked the respondents to grade how disruptive Amazon’s RxPass and The Mark Cuban Cost Plus Drug Company might be. Both enterprises are positioning themselves as low-cost providers of generic drugs that avoid pharmacy benefit managers. The respondents graded their potential for disruption almost identically. Fifty-three percent said RxPass will be very disruptive or disruptive and 48% viewed Mark Cuban’s generic drug business that way.
The respondents to the pharmacy survey were spread fairly evenly across the various sectors of the U.S. healthcare industry, with 20% self-identifying as working for hospitals, 22% for physician practices, 19% for pharmacy benefit managers, 16% for payer organizations, 13% for drug and device manufacturers and the rest in a variety of sectors. The online survey was conducted Feb. 14-28, 2023.
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