scientificamerican | First came Martin Shkreli, the brash young pharmaceutical
entrepreneur who raised the price for an AIDS treatment by 5,000
percent. Then, Heather Bresch, the CEO of Mylan, who oversaw the price
hike for its signature Epi-Pen to more than $600 for a twin-pack, though
its active ingredient costs pennies by comparison.
Now a small Virginia company called Kaleo is joining their ranks. It
makes an injector device that is suddenly in demand because of the
nation’s epidemic use of opioids, a class of drugs that includes heavy
painkillers and heroin.
Called Evzio, it is used to deliver naloxone, a life-saving antidote to overdoses of opioids. More than 33,000 people are
believed to have died from such overdoses in 2015. And as demand for
Kaleo’s product has grown, the privately held firm has raised its
twin-pack price to $4,500, from $690 in 2014.
Founded by twin brothers Eric and Evan Edwards, 36, the company first
sought to develop an Epi-Pen competitor, thanks to their own food
allergies.
Now, they’ve taken that model and marketed it for a major public
health crisis. It’s another auto-injector that delivers an inexpensive
medicine.
One difference, though, is that Evzio talks users through the process
as they inject naloxone. The company says the talking device is worth
the price because it can guide anyone to jab an overdose victim
correctly, leave the needle in for the right amount of time and
potentially save his or her life.
According to Food and Drug Administration estimates,
the Kaleo product, which won federal approval in 2014, accounted for
nearly 20 percent of the naloxone dispensed through retail outlets
between 2015 and 2016, and for nearly half of all naloxone products
prescribed to patients between ages 40 and 64—the group that comprises
the bulk of naloxone users.
