AARP: Even in pandemic year, average price increase for common drugs more than twice inflation

Retail prices for 260 widely used brand-name prescription drugs last year increased by an average 2.9%, more than twice the general rate of inflation, according to a report released yesterday by AARP’s Public Policy Institute.
 
“Increases in the retail price of brand name prescription drugs have a corresponding impact on the cost of therapy for the individual and for all other payers,” the authors note. “In 2020, the average cost of therapy for a brand name prescription drug, based on the market basket in this study, was $6,600 per year.”
 
A second AARP PPI analysis found that Medicare Part D spent nearly $40 billion more on 50 top brand-name drugs between 2015 and 2019 because drug price increases exceeded inflation.