Sorry Amgen, price hikes aren’t trade secrets 

Drug makers can’t claim that potential price hikes that they have to disclose under a relatively new California law are trade secrets, a state appeals court ruled last week. The case concerns California’s controversial drug pricing transparency law commonly known as S.B. 17, which requires drug makers to notify all major purchasers of drugs that a price hike is coming, 60 days before it takes effect. 

Drug makers have made no bones about their disdain for S.B. 17. In fact, PhRMA is currently locked in a separate legal battle in federal court, in which it’s arguing that the law is unconstitutional. 

In the state case, Amgen had sued the California Correctional Health Care Services after it announced it would share Amgen’s pricing disclosures with Reuters pursuant to a freedom of information request, arguing that disclosing a company’s pricing strategy would amount to disclosing trade secrets. 

An appeals court in Los Angeles overruled a lower court Thursday and decided that Amgen doesn’t have the right to block disclosure of this information. While it’s a wonky issue, it’s sure to impact more than Amgen: Two other drug makers, GlaxoSmithKline and Viiv Healthcare have also taken legal action on similar grounds in recent months, according to the Amgen ruling.