Hospitals around the country are taking action to lower the price of needed drugs by making their own, and the group doing this includes a health system in Wisconsin.
Intent to form such a company was made public in January and formally announced on Thursday.
This follows government efforts to find a solution to persistent drug shortages which have concerned hospitals around the country and in Wisconsin.
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In July, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration created a taskforce to look into the issue.
The Utah health system, Intermountain, is leading the charge to start manufacturing generic drugs. It is one of seven systems forming the drug company, which will be called Civica Rx. SSM Health is one of the partners.
“And with drug prices continuing to increase, in some cases very significantly for some of the most vulnerable populations, we realized a new solution was needed,” said Carter Dredge, chief transformation officer for SSM Health, which is based in Missouri and has hospitals in Janesville, Baraboo and Madison.
The hospitals still need permits from the FDA before they can manufacture pharmaceuticals. In the meantime, they’ll contract out for them.
Civica Rx plans to market 14 common generic drugs. Dredge declined to name the drugs. Medications that have been in short supply recently include local anesthetics like lidocaine, injectable painkillers and antimicrobials.
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