Nearly 8,000 Packets of Orkambi Destroyed as the U.K. and Vertex Hash out Pricing Concerns

Cystic fibrosis drugmaker Vertex Pharmaceuticals was forced to destroy nearly 8,000 packs of its drug Orkambi after the medication had expired before they could be shipped to the United Kingdom due to a contentious pricing fight. Boston-based Vertex and the National Health Service in England have been at odds over the £100,000 per year price the company is seeking to charge for Orkambi. The NHS believes the price is too high and the medication has gone unused, The Guardian reported Wednesday. The 7,880 packets of medication that were destroyed amounted to 600 years’ supply for England. Each of the packets of Orkambi provides 28 days’ worth of treatment for a cystic fibrosis patient. In its report, The Guardian noted that the amount of medication destroyed could have provided treatment for about 100 cystic fibrosis patients for up to six years. There are approximately 10,000 cystic fibrosis patients in the United Kingdom and about 40 percent of them are expected to benefit from Orkambi. A combination of Kalydeco and lumacaftor, Orkambi, was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in the summer of 2015 and was also approved for use in Europe and the U.K. that same year.