Policy Objectives

Price control policies rest on the faulty assumption that prescription drug and treatment prices can be mandated without risks. In actuality, they undercut the biopharmaceutical industry’s ability to invest in the research and development of new treatments and cures. Economic incentive is necessary for drug makers to undertake R&D, which is timely and costly. Price controls would dramatically undercut how investments are made toward innovation.

The biopharmaceutical industry had predicted that price controls would jeopardize companies’ ability to bring future medical marvels to market. Notwithstanding the threat that they pose to countless patent benefits, Congress crafted the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), including those price control provisions. Sadly for survivors, the bill passed in a party-line partisan vote and was later signed into law by President Biden.

Congress must repeal the price controls within the IRA and abandon any further future implementation of these dangerous mandates.

Every year, the U.S. pharmaceutical industry develops various new drugs that provide valuable medical benefits. These drugs and therapies are everything from cancer to sickle cell anemia and high blood pressure, delivering value to people struggling with the most chronic rare diseases or common health conditions. This innovation is continuously evolving as drug makers research new uses and formularies to treat different medical conditions, patient populations, and new dosage forms to help increase patient use.

Supporting their innovation will bring more treatments and therapies to fruition for various diseases and the patients fighting them.

The current medical innovation ecosystem inspires and rewards risky investments in the research and development of novel and experimental treatments. These inventions often treat chronic and rare diseases that may have had limited or no therapeutic alternatives, making them life-changing for patients who had no other recourse.

Patents are an indispensable tool for encouraging the invention of these life-saving medicines. Any government confiscation of patents that dissuades scientists, doctors, and researchers from taking risks in their pursuit of breakthrough cures and cutting-edge treatments is unacceptable. The only side effect of Washington bureaucrats meddling with long-standing protection for innovators is patients in the United States and around the world losing out on the kinds of life-saving advances only the American drug industry is equipped to provide.

For decades, drug middlemen have played a crucial role, acting as intermediaries between drug innovators and pharmacies to ensure patients could access prescription medications. However, today's Pharmacy Benefit Managers (PBMs) and their large insurer sponsors have exploited the system's opacity to prioritize their profits. This issue is part of a broader problem: limited transparency and monopolistic control leading to patient harm and higher costs in our healthcare system. To ensure patients receive the value they deserve in accessing medications, it is essential to hold PBMs accountable.