Pfizer fined £84.2m for drug price hike

The CMA imposed the fine following Pfizer’s decision to increase prices on phenytoin sodium capsules by up to 2,600%. Drug distributor Flynn Pharma was also fined £5.2 million.

Prior to September 2012, the company had produced and sold the capsules under the brand name Epanutin. When it sold UK distribution rights for Epanutin to Flynn Pharma, the drug was de-branded and its price no longer regulated.

According to the CMA, the amount the NHS was charged for 100mg packs of the drug “rocketed” from £2.83 to £67.50, before reducing to £54 from May 2014. As a result of the price increases, NHS expenditure on phenytoin sodium capsules increased from about £2 million a year in 2012 to about £50 million in 2013.

UK prices for the drug were also found to be far higher than in other European countries, the CMA added.

“This is the highest fine the CMA has imposed and it sends out a clear message to the sector that we are determined to crack down on such behaviour and to protect customers, including the NHS, and taxpayers from being exploited,” said  Philip Marsden, chairman of the Case Decision Group for the CMA’s investigation.

Pfizer has claimed that Epanutin was loss-making before it was de-branded, though the CMA has calculated that any such losses would have been recovered within two months of the price rises.

In a similar case brought earlier this year, the CMA fined a number of pharma firms – including GSK – a total of £44.99m.