Two years ago, Hassan’s father was faced with questions that he had no good answers for. "Why do I have this disease?" his seven-year-old son asked him. "Why do I have to live this life?"

When drug company chief executive Heather Bresch was hauled in front of Congress last year to defend the high price of lifesaving EpiPens, she drew skeptical lawmakers’ attention to a large poster board that blamed the skyrocketing price tag on a coterie of drug supply chain middlemen. Of EpiPen’s $608 list price, her company, Mylan, received only $274, Bresch said.