Sydney Lupkin
Sydney Lupkin is the pharmaceuticals correspondent for NPR.
She was most recently a correspondent at Kaiser Health News, where she covered drug prices and specialized in data reporting for its enterprise team. She's reported on how tainted drugs can reach consumers, how companies take advantage of rare disease drug rules and how FDA-approved generics often don't make it to market. She's also tracked pharmaceutical dollars to patient advocacy groups and members of Congress. Her work has won the National Press Club's Joan M. Friedenberg Online Journalism Award, the National Institute for Health Care Management's Digital Media Award and a health reporting award from the Society for Advancing Business Editing and Writing.
Lupkin graduated from Boston University. She's also worked for ABC News, VICE News, MedPage Today and The Bay Citizen. Her internship and part-time work includes stints at ProPublica, The Boston Globe, The Boston Herald, The New England Center for Investigative Reporting and WCVB.
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Drug company reps commonly visit doctors to talk about new medications. A team of economists wanted to know if that helps patients live longer. They found that for cancer patients, the answer is no.
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As a shortage of growth hormone used to treat rare diseases in children drags on, families and doctors are struggling with insurers' requirements to get prescriptions filled.
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Most of the largest pharmaceutical companies report losing money in the United States, despite the majority of their sales coming from Americans. The result is lower U.S. taxes for the companies.
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Opill, an over-the-counter birth control pill, goes on sale online today. The pill is expected to be available in stores within a few weeks.
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Bayer is adding two of its name-brand drugs to the roster of Cost Plus Drugs: the birth control pill Yaz and the menopause treatment Climara.
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The Senate HELP committee questioned pharmaceutical CEOs about how much more Americans pay for the same drugs sold for less in Canada, Japan and Europe.
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Spoiler: There are some decreases this year, too. Here's an overview of the changing prices and what to make of them.
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The Food and Drug Administration's authorization of Florida's plan to import prescription medicines from Canada is a first. But the state still has hurdles to clear before imports could begin.
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Flovent — a common asthma inhaler — will be discontinued in 2024. There will be a generic version available, but the change could make it hard for some patients to get their medication.
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Hospitals rely on scores of generic drugs given by injection. But these workhorses are often in short supply. Cheap prices have led to factory closures that leave the supply chain vulnerable.