The problem with drug pricing is simple. The research and development of a new drug is in the tens of millions of dollars and more. Once the drug is approved the manufacturing process is relatively cheap.
The consumer in the United State pays for the costs of research and development. Other nations will set prices for these drugs. The manufacturer is quite happy to sell at this price as the cost of production is low. They can make a good profit even at these low prices. It is not the drug companies fault. They are doing business in a perfectly rational manner as dictated by foreign governments price controls.
What Donald Trump is trying to do will make our costs go down and the costs go up in foreign nations that dictate the price of drugs in their nations. Thus they will pay their fair share of the research and development costs.
cpdiii Pharmacist
I forgot to add this.
There is a real problem with generic drugs in our nation. Generic companies have been known to buy up all the companies making a specific generic drug. They then inflate the price to obscene levels. They in effect become a monopoly of a very cheap product and thus can then determine the price as they wish.
This must stop!
The way to stop this is to allow foreign drug manufacturers easy access to our markets. Case in point is India. They have manufacturers of extreme high quality of our generic drugs. Give them access to our markets and the prices of these drugs will go down greatly.
If they can meet FDA standards of quality and control, let them into our markets.
cpdiii Pharmacist.
“The research and development of a new drug is in the tens of millions of dollars and more”
R&D, being a trek into the unknown, is susceptible to enormous overspending. People are making a lot of money on dead-end R&D that they know is dead-end but like the money.
Drug testing is another area that soaks up money. Who knows how much a drug should be tested? Let’s err on the side of lawsuit resistance and making ourselves rich.