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A decision by the drug maker Novartis to put a $2.1 million price tag on its latest product, a one-time treatment for a rare and fatal childhood disease, has sparked a national debate about just how much society should pay for the medicines it needs. ...Novartis has argued that its therapy, approved last month as Zolgensma, is cost-effective even at $2.1 million. SMA is a progressive disease that gradually erodes muscular function. (Garde, 6/3)

This year’s conference will offer panels with titles like “Bitcoin your data!” and “How could AI help cure cancer in the next five years?” On Wednesday alone, three separate panels have the words “artificial intelligence” in their titles. A form of the word “disrupt” appears twice, for those counting. Representatives from 23andMe and Flatiron Health will speak, along with key digital health officials at big pharma companies like Roche and Novartis. (Sheridan, 6/3)

The infamous Party at BIO Not Associated with BIO is back — though not by the same name. The PABNAB moniker isn’t attached to the event’s online presence as it was in year’s past, but one of the same organizers, Martina Molsbergen Tamaro, is throwing a “Gladiators and Goddesses” themed bash at a venue near this year’s BIO International Conference, which begins Monday in Philadelphia. (SHeridan, 6/3)

The Trump administration is still deliberating two key drug-pricing policies several months after first announcing them, fueling speculation the administration could deviate from its original plans on a top presidential priority. The head of the Medicare and Medicaid programs told CQ Roll Call it was “hard to tell” whether one still-unseen proposal — a controversial idea to peg some Medicare drug reimbursements to prices in other wealthy countries that use price controls — could still be implemented in 2020. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator Seema Verma noted the administration would still have to gauge public feedback once the demonstration is unveiled. (Clason and Siddons, 6/3)

CVS Health Corp. is expected to defend its acquisition of insurer Aetna Inc. in two high-profile settings Tuesday, seeking to sell skeptical investors and a federal judge on the nearly $70 billion deal. CVS lawyers are slated to be in a Washington, D.C., federal court for the start of an unusual three-day proceeding in which U.S. District Judge Richard Leon is considering whether the Justice Department adequately protected competition when it approved the deal last year. (Kendall and Wilde Mathews, 6/2)

The news: If pancreatic tumors have mutations in the same BRCA gene that can increase women’s chance of ovarian or breast tumors, patients go an extra 3.6 months — twice as long — without dying or having their tumors grow by more than 30%. That such a benefit can matter emphasizes what a grim diagnosis pancreatic cancer is, and only a twentieth of pancreatic cancers are related to BRCA mutations. But for [José] Baselga and his new boss, Pascal Soriot, who talked to STAT at AstraZeneca’s spaceship-like booth at the annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology, the data symbolize the vast potential of targeted cancer drugs. (Herper, 6/2)

As a result of a wide-ranging probe into generic drug price fixing, Heritage Pharmaceuticals pleaded guilty to conspiring to set prices for a diabetes medicine and will pay more than $7 million to settle civil and criminal charges. The drug maker worked with several other companies and individuals between April 2014 and December 2015 to fix prices, rig bids, and allocate customers for the glyburide treatment, according to court documents. More than a half dozen other generic drug makers — including Aurobindo and Teva Pharmaceutical (TEVA) — sell a version of glyburide. (Silverman, 5/31)