Senator Manchin’s opposition to Build Back Better is a major blow against lowering prescription drug prices and holding Big Pharma accountable for price gouging. Refusing support for this bill means drug corporations can keep their monopoly power to set prices high and keep raising them even if seniors, patients and families go without life-saving medicines they need. Senator Manchin’s announcement puts him on the wrong side when it comes to affordable prescriptions.
We applaud the House Oversight Committee for its three-year investigation, which lays out in detail how Big Pharma’s profit-driven practices are making it harder for families nationwide to afford their prescription drugs, especially in the midst of an ongoing global pandemic.
Lowering prescription drug prices is one of the most immediate and significant ways we can help families currently struggling with high costs. President Biden’s focus on lowering costs for seniors, people who rely on insulin, and working families is critically important to making sure the Build Back Better Act passes quickly.
The House’s passage of the Build Back Better Act is a significant first step toward breaking up Pharma’s monopoly power over prices and making medicines more affordable for millions.
It is absolutely ridiculous that at the same time Big Pharma is spending literally hundreds of millions of dollars to try and stop lawmakers from lowering prescription drug prices for families, they’re also raising prices of the most expensive drugs in the U.S. to inflate profits.
Reports that Democrats in Congress have stepped back from the legislative and political abyss by deciding to include prescription drug reform in the Build Back Better plan is welcome news. Not only has poll after poll shown that this is a top concern for voters, but Democrats have been campaigning and winning on this issue for years.
While some parts of the Build Back Better framework may be historic, without meaningful prescription drug reform that enables the federal government to negotiate lower prices we cannot truly build back better as a nation.
