The dance continues

After freaking out over the very idea that their biggest customer wanted to negotiate prices like some kind of dirty capitalist, drug companies reluctantly entered negotiations with HHS over a whopping 10 high-priced drugs.

The government made offers, the pharma companies submitted counteroffers, and now the feds have responded — and the pharma companies are saying, ‘Heck, it wasn’t as bad as we expected.’

Next: “Medicare and each drugmaker can meet for haggling sessions as many as three times in the next several months.”

More early birds welcome!

Early-bird registration for the Georgia Pharmacy Convention — save $TK! — has been extended until this Monday, April 10. You have one week to register and get the best rate!

Of course, if you want to spend a little more, please wait until the 11th, but that’s kind of silly, innit?

ICYMI

Not only did bird flu make the jump to dairy cows, then it jumped from a cow to a human in Texas. His primary symptom was conjunctivitis, but he’s still being isolated while being treated with Tamiflu while awaiting the mockery that will surely come his way.

“So far, there are no signs that the virus has evolved in ways that would help it spread more easily among people, federal officials have said.” Hmm.

Wegovy gets first Part D coverage

The other day Medicare gave permission for part D plans to start covering Wegovy for heart issues (but not weight loss). Now the first private plans — from CVS Health, Elevance (CarelonRx), and Kaiser Permanente — have said they’ll start paying for them.

Again, this is only for “reducing the risk of heart attacks and strokes in people who have cardiovascular disease [and] meet body-weight criteria.” And it’s only Wegovy that’s covered because it’s got a study showing it reduces cardiovascular risk — although with this treasure box opened you can expect the other GLP-1 drugs to have similar studies soon.

Measles continues to spread

Another win for anti-vaxxers as measles cases in the US jumped by 51 percent in just one week.

The really scary part is that more than half of cases (56 percent) “have required hospitalization for isolation or management of virus complications.” And for kids it’s higher: 68 percent. So no, it’s not just a matter of being a bit sick for a few days.

The good news is that the number of cases is still low — about 100 cases nationwide across 17 states.

Well this is slightly embarrassing

The latest version of ChatGPT “Outperformed Physicians in Clinical Reasoning in Head-To-Head Study.” That means it did more than just look up a list of symptoms and make a guess; it was given the patients’ complaints, vital signs and other basic patient info, and the results of diagnostic tests. Then it gave its differential diagnoses, which were compared to those of 21 attending physicians and 18 residents using a test of clinical reasoning called r-IDEA.

[T]he chatbot earned the highest r-IDEA scores, with a median score of 10 out of 10 for the LLM [large language model], 9 for attending physicians and 8 for residents. It was more of a draw between the humans and the bot when it came to diagnostic accuracy—how high up the correct diagnosis was on the list of diagnosis they provided—and correct clinical reasoning.

ChatGPT was, however “just plain wrong” more often when it came to actually providing reasoning for its answers. (I.e., it got the answers correct as often as humans, but didn’t get there the right way. Take from that what you will.)

Elsewhere: Maple Syrup edition

Canada, like most of the world, has universal healthcare for its citizens — but that hasn’t included pharmaceutical coverage. That, though, is changing as the country prepares to roll out prescription benefits nationwide.

And one of the first parts of that rollout is free contraception for women.

The government will pay for the most widely used methods to avoid pregnancy, such as IUDs, contraceptive pills, hormonal implants or the day after pill, for the nine million Canadian women of reproductive age.

(Also part of this initial rollout is complete coverage of diabetes medication. That’s not as big a deal because insulin is, like, two bucks a month up there anyway.)

The Long Read: Go Big or Go Home edition

With all the fuss about weight loss, you know who’s hurting? Companies like General Mills, maker of Cocoa Puffs and Lucky Charms. So what are they doing about it? Jumping on the “anti-diet” movement to convince people that being overweight is just fine*.

General Mills has toured the country touting anti-diet research it claims proves the harms of “food shaming.” It has showered giveaways on registered dietitians who promote its cereals online with the hashtag #DerailTheShame, and sponsored influencers who promote its sugary snacks.

* No, we’re not implying that there’s anything wrong with not being a Barbie doll, weight-wise. But from a health perspective there are some serious issues when someone feels it’s okay to dive into the Twinkie box mouth wide open.