Trending News Today: Pharmaceutical Companies Invest Heavily in Cancer Drugs

Colorado has proposed a radical alternative to abandon Obamacare by creating a new taxpayer-financed public health system, The New York Times reported. This new proposal, which would guarantee that everyone receives coverage, is set to go before Colorado voters in November. The estimated proposal is $38 billion per year.

On Thursday, a large amount of pharmaceutical companies decided to merge, resulting in more than $40 billion of deals, reported The New York Times. Teaming up with a company that manufactures the same product provides several benefits to health care companies. Deals worth nearly $60 billion were announced in the sector over the past 4 days, excluding the $150 billion merger of Pfizer and Allergan. “Imagine it’s a swim meet and Abbott has their toe in the water,” said Danielle Antalffy, an analyst at Leerink. “You can’t win unless you jump in the pool.” David Friend, a managing director of BDO’s Center for Healthcare Excellence and Innovation weighed in on the subject as well stating, “If you can get enough critical mass as part of these acquisitions, they’ll need you and then you’ll have a place in the new world. If you’re too small, or too limited, you’ll just become irrelevant and bypassed.”

Pharmaceutical companies are placing multi-billion dollar offers on new cancer drugs they hope will generate big sales. According to The Wall Street Journal, deals are being made despite the public outcry over the rising cost of cancer treatments. Politicians, doctors, and health insurance companies continue to blast the industry for its high pricing, with many cancer drugs costing more than $10,000 per patient per month. On Thursday, Sanofi announced an unsolicited $9.3 billion offer to purchase Medivation Inc, a company that sells a prostate cancer drug, while AbbVie has agreed to pay $5.8 billion for Stemcentrx.