Mer­ck to par­tic­i­pate in Medicare ne­go­ti­a­tions process 'un­der protest,' fol­low­ing at least three oth­ers

Mer­ck said on Thurs­day that it will par­tic­i­pate “un­der protest” in the first round of price ne­go­ti­a­tions with the Cen­ters for Medicare and Med­ic­aid Ser­vices for its type 2 di­a­betes treat­ment Janu­via (sitagliptin).

The com­pa­ny is the fourth to an­nounce that it will agree to the In­fla­tion Re­duc­tion Act’s Medicare ne­go­ti­a­tions process ahead of an Oct. 1 dead­line for par­tic­i­pa­tion, fol­low­ing Bris­tol My­ers Squibb, As­traZeneca and Boehringer In­gel­heim. More are like­ly to fol­low, as those who do not com­ply will face a steep tax or risk los­ing out on Medicare and Med­ic­aid cov­er­age al­to­geth­er. The IRS has pub­lished pro­posed guid­ance on how tax­pay­ers will re­port li­a­bil­i­ty for such ex­cise tax­es.

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