Statement from Margarida Jorge, campaign director for Lower Drug Prices Now, on news that drug companies have continued to hike drug prices during the pandemic:
“It’s disappointing — but hardly surprising — that even in the middle of a global pandemic, drug corporations have continued to hike the prices of drugs people depend on for their health and–sometimes–even their survival. While Americans started 2021 facing the worst health and economic crisis in modern history, drug corporations rang in the New Year by raising their prices on more than 300 drugs.
Despite repeated promises from the Trump Administration to hold the industry accountable over the past four years, there has been no meaningful action to rein in egregious price gouging. Instead, even in a crisis, drug corporations are practicing the same ‘business as usual’ that has made them the most profitable industry in the nation, while making excuses for putting medicine out of reach of millions of people.
The plain truth is that until Congress and the Biden Administration take action to end Big Pharma’s monopoly control to set and keep prices high, drug corporations will keep charging Americans more for their prescription medicines than people pay anywhere else in the world. Meanwhile, millions of sick people will go without basic treatments.”