The Top 5 Biosimilar Articles for the Week of June 24

Number 5: British Columbia's Biosimilars Initiative successfully saved about $732 million over 5 years by switching over 40,000 patients from reference biologics to biosimilars, while maintaining equivalent health outcomes and reinvesting the savings into the province's public payer program (BC PharmaCare) to enhance drug coverage and health care services.

Number 4: Sarfaraz K. Niazi, PhD, makes suggestions for what arguments will help convince the FDA to waive clinical efficacy testing requirements for biosimilar approvals.

Number 3: The broader adoption of biosimilar drugs has the potential to significantly reduce cancer care costs and improve patient access to more affordable treatments, benefiting both patients and payers. However, a recent review highlights that biosimilar uptake has been hindered by various economic, practical, attitudinal, and psychological factors.

Number 2: In the second and final part of this series installment by The Center for Biosimilars®, the role of payers, pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs), and the financial incentives that influence prescription choices are addressed as obstacles towards affordable biosimilar treatments, specifically among underserved communities.

Number 1: The FDA has issued an update to its guidance on requiring switching study data for biosimilars to be granted interchangeability, citing new science that shows these studies aren’t needed to establish biosimilar safety.

To read all of these articles and more, visit centerforbiosimilars.com.