Former hedge fund manager buys AIDS drug, makes it 5500 percent more expensive

The price of a medicine used to treat parasitic infections, widely used by AIDS patients, has skyrocketed from $13.50 to $750 a pill, after a former hedge fund manager purchased the rights to the drug.

The move has been labelled “price-gouging” by Hillary Clinton, who said she plans to outlaw the practice.

The price of the drug, Daraprim, increased by more than 5500 percent after it was bought by Turing Pharmaceuticals, a start-up founded by 32-year-old Martin Shkreli, The New York Times reports.

Daraprim was launched 62 years ago, and is commonly used to treat toxoplasmosis, which can threaten the lives of immune-compromised patients including babies, AIDS and cancer patients. Several years ago the drug cost as little as $1.

Infectious disease expert Dr Judith Aberg, from the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, said the increase may force hospitals to use less efficient therapies.

“What is it that they are doing differently that has led to this dramatic increase?” she asked.

“This seems to be all profit-driven for somebody, and I just think it’s a very dangerous process.”

Mr Shkreli has responded on social media and television to widespread criticism about the increase, claiming that the price increase was necessary in order to fund more research and development.

“We’re certainly not the first company to raise drug prices,” he told CNBC.

He also guaranteed “better access” to the drug “at lower prices to patients than ever” in a tweet today.

The Infectious Diseases Society of America and the HIV Medicine Association have told the Turing Company that the Daraprim increase is “unjustifiable for the medically vulnerable patient population” and “unsustainable for the health care system”.