Noor Ul Ain Rehman
4 min read
In This Article:
We recently published a list of 11 Best Performing Healthcare Stocks to Buy Now. In this article, we are going to take a look at where Soleno Therapeutics, Inc. (NASDAQ:SLNO) stands against other best performing healthcare stocks to buy now.
On April 15, CNBC reported that President Trump’s healthcare-focused executive order brought in a win for the sector. Trump directed his health department to collaborate with Congress to revamp a law allowing Medicare to negotiate prescription drug prices. The announcement seeks to bring a change that the pharmaceutical company has lobbied for. Since the negotiation process is included in legislation, Trump’s executive order cannot implement the change itself. However, it directs Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to join hands with Congress and change it.
CNBC reported that drug makers have been working to delay the eligibility timeline for small-molecule drugs to be available for price negotiations by four years. This typically includes pills and most medications. This goes hand in hand with the 13-year wait until more complex biotech drugs are eligible for Medicare price negotiations.
Trump’s wide-ranging executive order also focuses on slashing healthcare costs. It comes a day after the administration instituted a national security report on the pharma industry. CNBC called the report “a precursor to sector-specific tariffs.”
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Medicare’s negotiating powers have been a subject of contention, as drug makers have opined that they would suppress innovation and have rallied against the time frame for negotiation eligibility for most drugs. The law now allows the government to negotiate prices for drugs with no competition, which includes complex biotech or biologic medications after 13 years on the market, but 9 years for their administration as capsules and pills.
Although they did not provide specifics, White House officials told reporters that other changes to the negotiation process would yield more savings than those attained during the first round under the Biden administration. While the Biden administration negotiated price cuts as steep as 79% for the first ten most expensive drugs to the Medicare program, the Trump administration would negotiate prices for the following 15 medications. This includes Pfizer’s cancer drugs Ibrance and Xtandi, as well as Novo Nordisk’s blockbuster diabetes and weight-loss treatments Ozempic and Wegovy.
