
Gilead Reaches $202 Million Settlement Over Payments to Doctors
Gilead Sciences Inc. reached a $202 settlement with the US to resolve claims that it paid doctors and gave them meals and travel expenses for events to get them to prescribe its drugs.
Federal prosecutors in Manhattan alleged that Gilead conducted programs from January 2011 to November 2017 to promote and increase sales of its drugs to treat the AIDS virus. The events were supposed to be purely educational, with modest meals.

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WebMD
39 minutes ago
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Living with HIV in the Rural South
Living with HIV can be challenging anywhere. But stigma can be devastatingly severe in small communities where privacy is more infringed, services can be limited and difficult to access, and the disease can be more deadly due to religious culture. The rural South can seem to be littered with a church of every denomination at almost every intersection. Local legislation and governing bodies reflect highly conservative views. And the culture is permeated with religious ideologies even in people who aren't religious, because Southern culture is pervasively influenced by the strictest traditions of Christianity. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with religion. But it should be a matter of choice, not coercion. In my opinion, Southern culture makes Christianity feel more coerced than chosen. Religious people have been at war with LGBT people for years, and LGBT people are disproportionately affected by HIV. At the beginning of the AIDS epidemic in 1981, the then-mysterious disease seemed to only affect gay men. So it was stigmatized by the church. This had a significant consequence. The fear of being judged or ostracized creates a perfect environment for the disease to flourish, thrive, and even spread because people are afraid to be tested. In small communities, privacy is usually heavily infringed upon and everyone knows everyone. So it only takes one person to reveal your HIV status. And disclosure of status can have devastating effects. Being tested for HIV may seem like a small thing, but it's not. If you're afraid to get tested, you might contract the virus and not know until you're very sick. Sometimes it's too late. Stigma alone perpetuates the spread of HIV and AIDS, and it's a barrier to prevention efforts. That's how religion makes the virus more deadly. But not all woes of rural communities are rooted in religion. The sprawling distances common in such areas can create barriers to accessing health services. This is another factor contributing to health care gaps in rural communities. Not only are distances longer, transportation can be less reliable or even nonexistent. Many rural areas have little or no public transportation. Not everyone has family or other means to provide travel to basic necessities like groceries and doctor appointments. Telemedicine can help, but it can't fill all needs. Rural isolation and loneliness can lead to mental health concerns. When you live with HIV, depression is common, partly because it's highly stigmatized. Loneliness intensifies the pain of depression. I live in a rural community, but I have quick access to the amenities of a small city. I'm blessed to live where I can find health care with HIV expertise, but resources can be limited. Wraparound services often fall through the cracks of a sparsely funded health care system. Some rely on help like the Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program that provides assistance for low-income people living with HIV. Without this assistance, people would die. Many rural areas have rising numbers of new HIV diagnoses, due to intravenous drug use. Needle exchange programs can help prevent HIV transmission and eliminate the risk of a community outbreak, as they have in the past. But many of these communities have religious objections to free needle exchanges. They claim to feel responsible for contributing to the drug problem by supplying clean needles. But they don't realize the greater danger is contracting HIV. In 2014-2015, in Scott County, Indiana, there was an HIV outbreak among drug-injecting populations. A temporary needle exchange program was established and the outbreak was curbed, showing needle exchanges work. But the program was halted when the outbreak got under control. This allows for the continuation of HIV transmission. But why do anything about it until it makes the news, right? Our HIV prevention system is broken, largely because of religious beliefs influencing legislation and policy pertaining to this disease. People will continue to contract and transmit HIV because of it. Regardless of geographical location. But religious stigma is strongest in rural America, where there are greater numbers of new HIV cases. Religion isn't the only factor behind this. But you can change stigma and stereotypes before you can change the distance of a mile. Rural areas will always have more miles to traverse with fewer reliable methods of transportation. They'll always be poorer and more vulnerable to HIV transmission. Some of these factors can't be changed. But harmful beliefs about HIV must change, or this disease will never be eliminated. Conservative, rural communities will continue to be hotbeds for HIV to thrive.
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2 hours ago
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When developing countries band together, lifesaving drugs become cheaper and easier to buy − with trade-offs
Procuring lifesaving drugs is a daunting challenge in many low- and middle-income countries. Essential treatments are often neither available nor affordable in these nations, even decades after the drugs entered the market. Prospective buyers from these countries face a patent thicket, where a single drug may be covered by hundreds of patents. This makes it costly and legally difficult to secure licensing rights for manufacturing. These buyers also face a complex and often fragile supply chain. Many major pharmaceutical firms have little incentive to sell their products in unprofitable markets. Quality assurance adds another layer of complexity, with substandard and counterfeit drugs widespread in many of these countries. Organizations such as the United Nations-backed Medicines Patent Pool have effectively increased the supply of generic versions of patented drugs. But the problems go beyond patents or manufacturing – how medicines are bought are also crucially important. Buyers for low- and middle-income countries are often health ministries and community organizations on tight budgets that have to negotiate with sellers that may have substantial market power and far more experience. We are economists who study how to increase access to drugs across the globe. Our research found that while pooling orders for essential medicines can help drive down costs and ensure a steady supply to low- and middle-income countries, there are trade-offs that require flexibility and early planning to address. Understanding these trade-offs can help countries better prepare for future health emergencies and treat chronic conditions. One strategy low-income countries are increasingly adopting to improve treatment access is 'pooled procurement.' That's when multiple buyers coordinate purchases to strengthen their collective bargaining power and reduce prices for essential medicines. For example, pooling can help buyers meet the minimum batch size requirements some suppliers impose that countries purchasing individually may not satisfy. Countries typically rely on four models for pooled drug procurement: One method, called decentralized procurement, involves buyers purchasing directly from manufacturers. Another method, called international pooled procurement, involves going through international institutions such as the Global Fund's Pooled Procurement Mechanism or the United Nations. Countries may also purchase prescription drugs through their own central medical stores, which are government-run or semi-autonomous agencies that procure, store and distribute medicines on behalf of national health systems. This method is called centralized domestic procurement. Finally, countries can also go through independent nonprofits, foundations, nongovernmental organizations and private wholesalers. We wanted to understand how different procurement methods affect the cost of and time it takes to deliver drugs for HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis, because those three infectious diseases account for a large share of deaths and cases worldwide. So we analyzed over 39,000 drug procurement transactions across 106 countries between 2007 and 2017 that were funded by the Global Fund, the largest multilateral funder of HIV/AIDS programs worldwide. We found that pooled procurement through international institutions reduced prices by 13% to 20% compared with directly buying from drug manufacturers. Smaller buyers and those purchasing drugs produced by only a small number of manufacturers saw the greatest savings. In comparison, purchasing through domestic pooling offered less consistent savings, with larger buyers seeing greater price advantages. The Global Fund and the United Nations were especially effective at lowering the prices of older, off-patent drugs. Cost savings from pooled drug procurement may come with trade-offs. While the Global Fund reduced unexpected delivery delays by 28%, it required buyers to place orders much earlier. This results in longer anticipated procurement lead time between ordering and delivery – an average of 114 days more than that of direct purchases. In contrast, domestic pooled procurement shortened lead times by over a month. Our results suggest a core tension: Pooled procurement improves prices and reliability but can reduce flexibility. Organizations that facilitate pooled procurement tend to prioritize medicines that can be bought at high volume, limiting the availability of other types of drugs. Additionally, the longer lead times may not be suitable for emergency situations. With the spread of COVID-19, several large armed conflicts and tariff wars, governments have become increasingly aware of the fragility of the global supply chain. Some countries, such as Kenya, have sought to reduce their dependence on international pooling since 2005 by investing in domestic procurement. But a shift toward domestic self-sufficiency is a slow and difficult process due to challenges with quality assurance and large-scale manufacturing. It may also weaken international pooled systems, which rely on broad participation to negotiate better terms with suppliers. Interestingly, we found little evidence that international pooled procurement influences pricing for the U.S. President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, a major purchaser of HIV treatments for developing countries. PEPFAR-eligible products do not appear to benefit more from international pooled procurement than noneligible ones. However, domestic procurement institutions were able to secure lower prices for PEPFAR-eligible products. This suggests that the presence of a large donor such as PEPFAR can cut costs, particularly when countries manage procurement internally. While international organizations such as the Medicines Patent Pool and the Global Fund can address upstream barriers such as patents and procurement in the global drug supply chain, other institutions are essential for ensuring that medicines actually reach patients. The U.S. Agency for International Development had played a significant role in delivering HIV treatment abroad through PEPFAR. The Trump administration's decision in February 2025 to cut over 90% of USAID's foreign aid contracts amounted to a US$60 billion reduction in overall U.S. assistance globally. An estimated hundreds of thousands of deaths are already happening, and millions more will likely die. The World Health Organization warned that eight countries, including Haiti, Kenya, Nigeria and Ukraine, could soon run out of HIV treatments due to these aid cuts. In South Africa, HIV services have already been scaled back, with reports of mass layoffs of health workers and HIV clinic closures. These downstream cracks can undercut the gains from efforts to make procuring drugs more accessible if the drugs can't reach patients. Because HIV, tuberculosis and malaria often share the same treatment infrastructure – including drug procurement and distribution networks, laboratory systems, data collection, health workers and community-based services – disruption in the management of one disease can ripple across the others. Researchers have warned of a broader unraveling of progress across these infectious diseases, describing the fallout as a potential 'bloodbath' in the global HIV response. Research shows that supporting access to treatments around the world doesn't just save lives abroad. It also helps prevent the next global health crisis from reaching America's doorstep. This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit, independent news organization bringing you facts and trustworthy analysis to help you make sense of our complex world. It was written by: Lucy Xiaolu Wang, UMass Amherst and Nahim Bin Zahur, Queen's University, Ontario Read more: Pharma's expensive gaming of the drug patent system is successfully countered by the Medicines Patent Pool, which increases global access and rewards innovation Cutting HIV aid means undercutting US foreign and economic interests − Nigeria shows the human costs Grassroots AIDS activists fought for and won affordable HIV treatments around the world – but PEPFAR didn't change governments and pharma The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Yahoo
21 hours ago
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RBC Capital Lifts Gilead Sciences (GILD) PT to $95 On Insights From a 2022 Patient Survey
Gilead Sciences Inc. (NASDAQ:GILD) is one of the 11 most profitable NASDAQ stocks to buy now. On June 11, RBC Capital increased its price target for Gilead Sciences to $95 from $92, while maintaining a Sector Perform rating. This adjustment is based on insights from a 2022 patient survey, which assessed perceptions of lenacapavir among high-risk individuals on and off PrEP (pre-exposure prophylaxis), especially after phase 3 data release and in anticipation of its potential market launch. The firm's analysis suggests that high clinician engagement, lower-than-expected adherence to oral PrEP medications, and the potential for current PrEP users to switch to lenacapavir could all facilitate growth for Gilead Sciences, even with some cannibalization of its existing product called Descovy. A physician and a patient having a discussion in a hospital about biopharmaceutical medicines. In Q1 2025, Gilead Sciences reported total revenue of $6.67 billion, which was flat year-on-year and missed Street's estimates by 2.1%. Despite the revenue miss, Gilead reconfirmed its full-year revenue guidance at the midpoint of $28.4 billion, which is 1.1% below analysts' estimates. These results were driven by growth in the company's core HIV and liver disease segments, particularly from strong demand for Biktarvy and the ongoing launch of Libdelzi. Gilead Sciences Inc. (NASDAQ:GILD) is a biopharmaceutical company that discovers, develops, and commercializes medicines in the areas of unmet medical need in the US, Europe, and internationally. While we acknowledge the potential of GILD as an investment, we believe certain AI stocks offer greater upside potential and carry less downside risk. If you're looking for an extremely undervalued AI stock that also stands to benefit significantly from Trump-era tariffs and the onshoring trend, see our free report on the . READ NEXT: and . Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.