NHS watch­dog im­pos­es $84M fine on Pfiz­er, Fly­nn Phar­ma in newest de­vel­op­ment of price-goug­ing saga

Ten years af­ter two com­pa­nies al­leged­ly start­ed to price-gouge the UK health­care sys­tem, an­oth­er fine has been levied.

The UK gov­ern­ment put out word Thurs­day that Pfiz­er and UK biotech Fly­nn Phar­ma were fined 70 mil­lion pounds ($84 mil­lion) by the coun­try’s an­titrust watch­dog for over­charg­ing the Na­tion­al Health Ser­vices (NHS) for epilep­sy drug Epanutin.

And there’s some his­to­ry here. The Com­pe­ti­tion and Mar­kets Au­thor­i­ty (CMA) had orig­i­nal­ly fined Pfiz­er and Fly­nn close to 90 mil­lion pounds in 2016 for in­flat­ing prices for Epanutin by as much as 2,600% — ri­val­ing Mar­tin Shkre­li’s in­fa­mous 2015 price hike of Dara­prim by 5,000%.

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