Kirsten Axelsen

Kirsten Axelsen focuses on biopharma reimbursement and health policy and has worked with biopharmaceutical and related companies for over 20 years on business strategy and public affairs in the US, EU, China and Emerging Markets. She is an advisor to the Life Sciences sector in the New York office.

Kirsten is an economist who works with healthcare clients on issues including Medicare reimbursement, payer contract negotiations, designing innovative reimbursement contracts. Kirsten works with biopharma, trade associations and health IT companies on pricing, reimbursement, patient assistance, public affairs, industrial organization, and strategic matters. She has worked to developed policy platforms for CEO's and their organizations, including public positions on drug pricing, insurance coverage and regulatory reform. She has helped to establish pricing for medicines including in rare disease and oncology considering value and affordability. Kirsten has guided the development of patient financial assistance programs for biopharma. She has prepared companies and their leaders for Congressional investigations and testimony related to drug price, price increases marketing and research investment. She often uses financial models and data analytics to demonstrate how different stakeholders in the healthcare delivery chain are affected by policy and business practice to guide corporate policy and business practice recommendations and also to estimate the impact of policy change for corporate financial disclosure. 

Kirsten is a Health Innovator Fellow with The Aspen Institute, and a Visiting Scholar with The American Enterprise Institute. She has an M.S. in Economics from the University of Texas, Austin and is published for work in health policy and health economics.