"); } else if(is_tablet()){ slot_number++; document.write("

"); } ]]>

Claim:

On Jan. 21, 2024, a 22-year-old Wisconsin man died from a severe asthma attack days after he was unable to purchase his regular inhaler due to a sudden price hike and opted to pay his rent instead.

Rating:

Mixture

About this rating

In late December 2025, claims began circulating that a 22-year-old Wisconsin man named Cole Schmidtknecht was pronounced dead from an asthma attack in January 2024, just days after discovering the price of his usual inhaler had skyrocketed. 

Users on social media platforms such as Instagram (archived), Facebook (archived) and Reddit shared details of the alleged incident, with some claiming that Schmidtknecht chose to pay his rent instead of the unexpectedly high cost of his medication. 

The claim about Schmidtknecht's death is a mixture of true and undetermined information. He died as a result of a severe asthma attack on Jan. 21, 2024, days after leaving a Walgreens pharmacy without his Advair Diskus inhaler due to the medication's sharply increased cost.

However, claims that he chose to pay his rent instead of purchasing the medication are unconfirmed, according to his family.

Bill Schmidtknecht, Cole's father, told Snopes that the family was "not certain that Cole used any money to pay his rent, and I do not want that framed as a confirmed fact." 

He pointed out that the rent payment "scenario has sometimes been used illustratively to explain the type of impossible financial tradeoffs patients face," such as the claim described above, "but it should not be presented as something we can definitively verify in Cole's case."

In a message to Snopes, Bill Schmidtknecht wrote:

What is certain and documented is that Cole was confronted with a sudden, unannounced price increase for his prescribed asthma medication, resulting in an out-of-pocket cost of $538.19. That amount was unreasonable, unexpected, and presented without warning or meaningful alternatives. The lack of notice and lack of access were central to what occurred.

According to a lawsuit filed on Jan. 21, 2025, by the Schmidtknecht family against Optum Rx, a subsidiary of UnitedHealthcare, and Walgreens — where Cole Schmidtknecht attempted to get his inhaler — "Cole was advised by the Walgreens Defendants that his medication was no longer covered by his insurance and that his Advair Diskus preventative inhaler would cost him $539.19 out of pocket." 

Prior to the price hike, "the inhaler would cost no more than about $66.86, even during the deductible phase of coverage, or about $35 during the covered phase," according to the lawsuit.

The lawsuit further alleges that, despite a Wisconsin law requiring 30 days' notice, OptumRx never informed Schmidtknecht that his Advair Diskus inhaler or any of its generic equivalents would no longer be covered by insurance in 2024.

In a statement emailed to Snopes, a spokesperson for Optum Rx expressed sympathy to the Schmidtknecht family while denying the company bore liability in the case. The spokesperson said Cole Schmidtknecht's employer-provided insurance plan "adopted the updated Optum Rx Premium Standard formulary" on Jan. 1, 2024, which removed Advair Diskus but added "three clinically equivalent alternatives."

Optum Rx told Snopes that Schmidtknecht's claim to fill Advair Diskus was denied for two reasons: "(1) Advair Diskus was excluded from formulary; and (2) the maximum days' supply was 90, not 180 as Mr. Schmidtknecht was attempting to fill."

The company also said it sent an electronic message to Walgreens outlining options for "equivalent alternative drugs." Advair HFA, which "contains the same active ingredient as Advair Diskus but is delivered via an aerosol spray inhaler (HFA) instead of a dry powder inhaler (DPI)," was among the alternatives, the spokesperson said.

However, the lawsuit, embedded in full above, claims Walgreens "never provided Cole with any more affordable workarounds to obtain his usual inhaler" or a generic alternative. The document also alleges that Walgreens "told Cole that there were no cheaper alternatives or generic medications available."

In its response, Optum Rx further stated that "OptumRx and Walgreens records indicate that Mr. Schmidtknecht had not filled Advair Diskus or any other maintenance asthma medication for approximately two years prior to the formulary change." 

Snopes reached out to Schmidtknecht's family for a response to Optum Rx's claims and will update this article if we receive one.

The lawsuit states "the immediate cause of death listed on his death certificate was status asthmaticus," or acute severe asthma, and recounts the events leading to Schmidtknecht's death:

On January 15, 2024, five days after visiting the OptumRx-Walgreens pharmacy, Cole had a severe asthma attack and began to asphyxiate. His roommate, Mitchell Huiting, immediately drove him to the Emergency Room at ThedaCare Regional Medical Center-Appleton, located at 1818 North Meade Street, Appleton, Wisconsin 54911. 

Cole became unresponsive and pulseless in the car, about two minutes before they arrived. When he presented to the ER, practitioners recorded that Cole was unconscious, pulseless, and appeared blue. Emergency medical staff immediately gave Cole two rounds of epinephrin and performed two rounds of Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation, lasting over four minutes, to try to get him to regain consciousness. Despite their best efforts, Cole never woke up again. 

Cole remained in the Intensive Care Unit on a ventilator for six days, until doctors finally informed his parents, William and Shanon Schmidtknecht, that he was beyond help. On January 21, 2024, Cole's parents agreed to withdraw life supporting care and Cole was pronounced dead.

Walgreens had not responded to Snopes' request for comment as of this writing.

In March 2024, GSK, the manufacturer of Advair Diskus, announced it would "cap out-of-pocket costs for eligible patients at no more than $35 per month for all of its asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) medicines," including Advair Diskus. Snopes reached out to GSK for insight on whether Schmidtknecht's case inspired the change and will update this story if we receive a response.

Where unproven claim about rent money originated

The unproven claim that Schmidtknecht chose to pay his rent instead of paying for his inhaler appeared to originate with remarks from Democratic U.S. Rep. Jake Auchincloss of Massachusetts on Dec. 4, 2024.

Auchincloss referenced Schmidtknecht's death to encourage the House of Representatives to sponsor a bill he described on his website as a method "to tackle the manipulative practices of Pharmacy Benefit Managers (PBMs) – the middlemen of drug pricing."

According to the American Medical Association, PBMs were established in the 1960s to "manage prescription drug plan benefits for insurers and/or employers, but "consolidation and vertical integration in the PBM market have raised concerns about the potential for reduced competition and higher prescription drug prices."

During his remarks, Auchincloss said (emphasis ours): 

Cole had recently moved back to Appleton, Wisconsin, to live with his best friend.

In January of 2024, Cole went to the pharmacy to refill his steroid medication for his asthma, a medication he had taken for years.

A Big Three pharmacy benefit manager had increased the price of Cole's daily asthma medication from around $35 to over $500. He was told that no generic drug would be covered by his insurance, and Cole was forced to choose between his medication and his rent. He chose to pay his rent.

Five days later, Cole suffered a severe asthma attack that led to cardiac arrest. On Jan. 21, 2024, Cole passed away.

[…]

I encourage my fellow members to protect patients like Cole and his family and to sponsor H.R. 9096, the Pharmacists Fight Back Act. In honor of Cole Schmidtknecht, we will carry forward the fight to end the price-gouging abuses of pharmacy benefit managers.

Schmidtknecht's father shared a video of Auchincloss' address on Facebook (archived) and said, "Our Sweet Cole William has been entered into the Congressional Record. Forever being part of American History. It's truly sad that it took his death to get him there. We will never stop fighting for you Sweet Cole."

FTC sues Optum Rx, other PBMs

Optum Rx is one of the three largest PBMs in the country, alongside Caremark Rx and Express Scripts, according to a Wisconsin Public Radio report about Schmidtknecht. The three companies together administer roughly 80% of all prescriptions nationwide, the report said. 

In September 2024, the Federal Trade Commission sued all three companies, alleging they engaged in anti-competitive and unfair rebating practices that have artificially inflated the list price of insulin drugs, impaired patients' access to lower list price products, and shifted the cost of high insulin list prices to vulnerable patients." 

A 2024 docuseries called "Modern Medicine Mafia," available to watch on YouTube, investigated the effects of PBMs and included Schmidtknecht's case. The documentary was previously available on Amazon and Vimeo, but in July 2025, The New York Times reported that it was removed after a law firm working for UnitedHealth Group sent a letter warning it was defamatory.

The lawsuits by the Schmidtknechts and the FTC were still pending as of this writing.