1. A federal jury ruled that AbbVie must pay $140 million to a patient who used its AndroGel testosterone gel. The jury found the company guilty of failing to properly disclose the conditions it treated safely. (Law360)
2. The Trump administration is expected to roll back a requirement that employers cover birth control in their health insurance plans. About 55 million women currently have access to birth control that doesn’t require co-pays. (NYT)
3. A study published in Science found that people who take a medicine they believe to be expensive are more likely to respond to it. Researchers had 49 people test two anti-itch creams, one expensive and one inexpensive. (NYT)
4. Bayer is standing by its peak sales estimate of $5.3 billion for Xarelto even after the drug was found to be no more effective than low-dose aspirin to reduce the risk of repeat strokes. (Reuters)
5. Only one out of three patients who had a prescription for a PCSK9 inhibitor ended up taking the drug. This was due to prior authorization and high copays, according to a study funded by Amgen, which markets PCSK9 inhibitor Repatha. (Reuters)
