Donald Trump signed an executive order this morning that promises to cut prescription drug prices by A LOT, maybe even by 90%!
In a Truth Social post on Sunday, Trump claimed that prescription drug costs would be reduced “almost immediately” by 30% to 80% and that the U.S. “will pay the same price as the Nation that pays the lowest price anywhere in the World.”
In a follow-up post Monday, Trump said drug prices would be cut by 59%. At the White House later Monday, Trump claimed drug prices would be reduced by 50% to 90%.
The order directs Health and Human Services Secretary RFK Jr. to come up with price-cutting goals within 30 days in negotiations with the drug industry. In the event the drug industry isn’t dealing, Kennedy and his brainworm-starved legal mind will implement and enforce the “most favored nation” pricing model, capping the U.S. prices at the lowest rates paid by other wealthy nations.
Brainworm Boi’s progressive Democrat kids had tears in their eyes!
Trump will fix “Biden’s bad drug price deal” to target not only medications paid for by Medicare, but also Medicaid and private insurance.
Trump also thinks this gives Republicans the tools to replace Obamacare.
Officials expect weight-loss drugs like Ozempic, Wegovy and Zepbound to be included in the deal, even though the Trump administration earlier rejected Biden’s proposed deal for Medicare to cover those drugs.
This should be a relief to Trump’s bigly successful businessman fat cat friend who complained about the cost of his “fat shot drug.”
Trump also threatened more trade war nonsense to countries who “extort” drug companies.
Arthur Caplan, the head of the medical ethics division at NYU Langone Medical Center in New York City, said relief would be great — but argued it’s impossible for the U.S. to achieve the lowest prices in the world.
“We are not going to get the price paid by South Africa, Peru, Egypt, Bolivia and Laos,” Caplan said. “Drug companies usually give whopping discounts to very poor countries on humanitarian grounds they won’t give rich countries. The prices paid in the poorest nations have no chance of being the price paid by the Trump administration.”
In a statement last week, Alex Schriver, a spokesperson for the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, said the Trump administration should instead focus on so-called pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) to address high drug costs.
PBMs, also known as middlemen, work with insurance companies to negotiate discounted prices from drug companies in exchange for including the drugs in their coverage. In theory, PBMs are supposed to save patients money, but they’ve been the target of U.S. lawmakers after government findings accused them of inflating the price of drugs.
