Nonprofit Gets Back Drug and Reverses 18-Fold Increase in Price

  • Drug's price rose to $360 a capsule after Rodelis acquired it
  • Under new owner, the cost will go down to $35 per capsule
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A nonprofit in Indiana has dropped the price of a drug for multi-drug resistant tuberculosis roughly 90% after re-acquiring rights to the medicine from Rodelis Therapeutics, the latest sign of a growing outcry over skyrocketing costs for rare disease treatments.

The price for the drug, called cycloserine, briefly soared to $360 per capsule, or $10,800 for package of 30 capsules, after Rodelis Therapeutics acquired the drug in August, according to Dan Hasler, president of the Purdue Research Foundation. Rodelis obtained rights to the treatment from the Chao Center for Industrial Pharmacy & Contract Manufacturing, part of the Indiana-based Purdue Research Foundation.