NORTH CAROLINA — Patients For Affordable Drugs Action released two new ads today to shed light on Senator Thom Tillis’ record of fighting for Big Pharma instead of North Carolina patients. The ads highlight Durham resident Matt Navey, who lives with Crohn’s disease and relies on the $11,000-a-month medication Humira, and Concord resident Danielle Hutchison, who lives with type 1 diabetes and has watched the price of insulin rise from $60 to $289 per vial. The new ads are part of a seven-figure campaign and will run on TV, radio, and digital platforms.
Watch Matt’s ad here and Danielle’s ad here.
“Matt and Danielle’s stories really drive home how Thom Tillis has hurt people by doing the bidding of Big Pharma,” said David Mitchell, a cancer patient and the president of Patients For Affordable Drugs Action. “We are doing everything in our power to make sure voters in North Carolina have the facts before they cast their ballots.”
Matt’s ad tells the story of a Durham carpenter who has been forced to skip doses of his medication, Humira. Humira’s manufacturer, the drug giant AbbVie, has raised the price of Humira every year for the last 17 years. When a bill was moving through the U.S. Senate to weaken AbbVie’s monopoly pricing power, pharma lobbyists confirmed they called on Tillis to water down the bill and leave open the loophole that AbbVie abuses to maintain high prices.
Danielle’s story highlights the outrageous price of insulin and Thom Tillis’ cozy relationship with drug manufacturers. Danielle uses six Lantus pens and two Novolog vials each month — these insulins cost a total of $1,088. Though Lantus entered the market in 2001 with a price of $34 per vial, Sanofi has hiked the price of the insulin 27 times — a 735 percent increase. Sanofi and Novo Nordisk, the companies that make Danielle’s insulins, have donated more than $27,000 to Tillis.
Tillis is the top recipient of AbbVie donations in Congress and has received more than $344,000 in campaign contributions from the pharmaceutical industry. In addition to authoring a bill to increase Big Pharma’s monopoly pricing power, Tillis resurrected a dormant Senate subcommittee to promote patent changes to help Big Pharma and introduced a bill that would restrict the ability of generic drugmakers to bring competitor drugs to market.
Last week, Patients For Affordable Drugs Action’s campaign launched with an adfeaturing Steven Hadfield, a North Carolinian who relies on a medication with a $132,000 price tag, and a new website where voters can hear more stories about the impact of high drug prices on North Carolina patients.
Patients For Affordable Drugs Action is a political action committee founded to make sure politicians hear from real patients and not just the pharmaceutical industry political machine. Big Pharma spent $298.2 million lobbying in 2019 and donated $29.3 millionto help elect politicians in the last election cycle. Patients For Affordable Drugs Action received funding from the Action Now Initiative, LLC. Patients For Affordable Drugs Action is an independent organization and refuses funding from any organization that profits from the development or distribution of prescription drugs.
THIS IS MATT TRANSCRIPT
This is Humira, the top-selling prescription drug in the world.
This is AbbVie, the drug company that raised the price of Humira every year for 17 years.
This is Thom Tillis. He wrote a bill that would help them keep raising its price.
And this is Matt, a North Carolina patient who was forced to skip doses because the price kept going up.
Thom Tillis should be working for us. Not drug companies.
Patients For Affordable Drugs Action is responsible for the content of this advertising.
DANIELLE TRANSCRIPT
I have to take this insulin every day to stay alive.
When I was first diagnosed, it cost $60 a vial. Now, it costs $289 a vial.
I’ve written to Thom Tillis, but instead of helping patients in North Carolina, he’s taken thousands from Big Pharma.
And he wrote legislation that would let them keep raising prices.
I want to be able to have a house and a family, but I can’t if I’m spending all of my money on medication.
We can’t afford six more years of Thom Tillis.
Patients For Affordable Drugs Action is responsible for the content of this advertising.
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Paid for by Patients For Affordable Drugs Action, www.p4adaction.org. Not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee.