Efforts in U.S. Senate to Tie U.S. Drug Prices to Foreign Government Price Controls Would Be Harmful to Patients, HLC President Says

WASHINGTON – The president of the Healthcare Leadership Council, a coalition of leaders from all sectors of American healthcare, is criticizing an effort in the U.S. Senate to link pharmaceutical prices in the United States to those of other countries that employ heavy-handed government price controls.

Some Democratic Senators are encouraging support for a resolution that would call upon the Biden Administration to enact measures that would impose a reference pricing model for prescription drugs in the U.S., essentially replacing our free market system with one in which prices would be limited to those of other countries that utilize government-enforced price ceilings.

“This was a bad idea when the previous Administration pursued it and it remains a bad idea today,” said HLC president Mary R. Grealy. “At a time in which medical innovation is critically needed to combat a deadly pandemic, there could not be a worse time to undermine the research and development of new treatments, cures, and vaccines.”

Ms. Grealy added, “Pursuing the immediate political appeal of lower prices, without actually lowering out-of-pocket costs for consumers, will impose long-term damage. The United States is the world’s premier biopharmaceutical innovator, with the swifter access to breakthrough medicines and the robust job creation that goes with that status. It makes little sense to put our country on the same plane as nations with significantly different economic philosophies and objectives.”

She said Congress and the Biden Administration should pursue more productive routes to increasing affordability, including measures to reduce consumer out-of-pocket costs and using trade negotiations to press other countries to pay their fair share for medical innovation.

For Immediate Release
February 18, 2021
Contact: Kelly Fernandez  202-449-3452