Senator Hassan Investigation Forces Big Pharma Company to Abandon Monopoly & Egregious Price Hike Strategy, Allowing Lower-Cost Generic Inhaler for Kids to Enter Market

Hassan Investigative Report Details How Kids Suffered While the Company Profited

New FDA Approved Generic Will Enable More Kids to Get Asthma Treatment They Need

WASHINGTON - Following two years of pressure from U.S. Senator Maggie Hassan (D-NH), Ranking Member of the Senate Finance Subcommittee on Health Care, a major pharmaceutical company has ended its decades-long practice of pairing egregious price hikes and monopoly protection by allowing a low-cost generic alternative for an asthma inhaler commonly used by children to enter the market.

Read Senator Hassan's new investigative report HERE.

"For decades, GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) has blocked competitors and increased prices on a life-saving asthma inhaler to unconscionable levels, with children, families, and taxpayers paying the price," said Senator Hassan. "Now that the company has given up its monopoly and finally allowed a lower-cost generic to enter the market, fewer families around the country will have to live in constant fear that their child may die from an asthma attack because GSK has priced them out of life-saving medication. Congress must act to close the loopholes that GSK exploited so that no other Big Pharma company can cause the harm that GSK did."

GSK, a massive multinational pharmaceutical company, previously manufactured Flovent, a life-saving asthma inhaler relied on by children across the country. GSK spent years increasing the price of Flovent well above the rate of inflation, protecting its monopoly over it, and squeezing families who relied on the drug. Then GSK went so far as to take Flovent off the market in 2024 after creating a more costly copycat all to exploit a loophole that enabled the company to avoid paying rebates to Medicaid for exorbitant price hikes. In a new investigative report released today, Senator Hassan details how GSK's tactics have harmed kids and families. Thanks to Senator Hassan's pressure, GSK has abandoned its monopoly over the drug and is now allowing a lower-cost generic competitor to enter the market. The new FDA-approved generic - approved just days before the release of Hassan's report - will mean that the nearly 5?million children with asthma in the United States?will?soon have access to a more affordable version of this medication.

Senator Hassan has been pressing GSK over its actions since 2024, when she first called on the company to restore Flovent to the market. Last year, she formally launched an investigation into the impact the profit-driven discontinuation had on families, culminating in this week's new report. As detailed in Hassan's new report, the removal of Flovent from the market significantly reduced access and created financial hardship for many of the 5 million children with asthma and their families nationwide, resulting in worsening symptoms, more emergency room visits, increased hospitalizations, and potentially even deaths.

Read Senator Hassan's full report on the health consequences to children and financial harm to families from GSK's profit-padding tactics HERE.

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