Photo: Collage of pills, money and arrows in a basket/Taylor Teeden biospace
The United States has contributed many important inventions over the past century and is proud to be a leader. But when it comes to the cost of healthcare, especially prescription drugs, there’s little to be proud of. Americans pay more for prescription drugs than any other country, yet life expectancy in the United States lags behind that of many other developed countries. Those aligned with the pharmaceutical industry argue that we should actually be grateful for these high prices because they encourage the development of new drugs. However, there is no correlation between the two.
It’s no secret that Americans are forced to pay exorbitant drug prices. I recently testified before the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee in response to the question, “Why does the United States pay the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs?”
For many people, the cost of essential medicines is prohibitive, forcing them to make difficult choices about giving up other necessities to purchase life-saving treatments or quitting them altogether. Almost one in three Americans do not take their medications as prescribed because of the high cost, instead resorting to rationing their medications or not taking them at all. This burden disproportionately impacts vulnerable populations, exacerbates health disparities, and perpetuates cycles of poverty and disease.
wrong priorities
The CEOs of Bristol-Myers Squibb, Johnson & Johnson and Merck told a Senate committee that drug pricing is fair and high because it is based on the value and investment provided. He said the price allows for a return on investment in the technology and research that goes into new drugs. But just because it’s expensive doesn’t mean it’s better, and just because it’s new doesn’t mean it’s improved. Many newly introduced drugs are not new, but simply variations of older drugs already on the market. A recent study found that about a third of drugs are no better than older drugs, and many are actually worse.
The advertising industry’s exorbitant spending raises questions about the industry’s own priorities. In recent years, pharmaceutical companies have allocated more funds to marketing and advertising than to research and development.
This is not a new habit.As Marcia Angell has written, in the last few decades The truth about pharmaceutical companies, Pharmaceutical companies spend, on average, 2.5 times more on marketing than on research and development. Pharmaceutical companies pay for clinical trials, many of which are Phase IV trials, which are primarily used to introduce drugs to doctors and patients by paying clinicians a fee to use the drug. , is another form of marketing. This skewed allocation of resources highlights the industry’s true priorities, which prioritize investments to maximize revenue over addressing unmet medical needs.
Furthermore, modern pharmaceutical business models prioritize acquisitions and mergers over investments in actual drug development, making drug companies more like venture capitalists and directing research funds toward corporate consolidation rather than medical advances. .
The need for patent reform
The real answer to the Senate Assistance Committee’s question about why the U.S. pays more is because the U.S. has a system that allows drug companies to dominate the market. This system prioritizes profits and the interests of shareholders and investors over health outcomes. Companies accomplish this by leveraging the patent system.
The system was designed to encourage unique inventions that would lead to breakthrough therapeutic advances, but patent strategies such as “evergreening” are now allowing existing drugs to be used to prevent generics from leaving the market. is expanding its monopoly. Patents should be reserved for new inventions, but pharmaceutical companies do so while heavily marketing tweaks to existing drugs as “innovations” in order to drive up prices and maximize profits. Additional frivolous patent applications are often filed. These patents may involve changing the dosage or needle size of an injection, or even offering the same drug in different formats or brands, a practice known as product hopping. This distortion of the patent system allows companies to set prices for drugs on which patients’ lives depend, while preventing competition to market.
While other governments have taken steps to negotiate drug prices with drug companies and rein in patent overreach, the United States has yet to show the leadership needed to ensure affordability for all Americans. Currently, the Inflation Control Act only allows the government to negotiate prices for a limited number of drugs for Medicare. As a result, Americans bear the brunt of soaring drug prices, subsidizing the U.S. pharmaceutical industry’s unquenchable thirst for higher CEO pay and profits.
We must reform and improve our patent system. We must also demand transparency and accountability from pharmaceutical companies to ensure that taxpayer-funded research delivers affordable treatments to those who need them most.
After all, the true measure of our success as a nation is not the profitability of our pharmaceutical industry or how many patents we can file, but rather the health and well-being of our people. It’s time to put people before profits and demand a health system that works for everyone. After all, the people of the United States have the freedom to access the latest medicines, but they don’t have the freedom to buy them.
Tahir Amin is co-founder and executive director of the Initiative for Medicines, Access and Knowledge (I-MAK), a global nonprofit organization dedicated to lowering drug prices. Follow @realtahiramin on X.
