Click here to view video of Murphy’s remarks.

WASHINGTON – U.S. Senators Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), a member of the U.S. Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, at a press conference Wednesday, along with U.S. Senators Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.), Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), and Patty Murray (D-Wash.) led their colleagues in making it clear that Medicare negotiation is the number one way to lower the cost of prescription drugs for millions of Americans.

“If the Trump administration is serious about wanting to lower prescription drug costs for seniors, then any proposal that passes Congress should give Medicare the authority to negotiate what it pays for those drugs,” said Murphy. “This is a total no brainer, and you can't make serious progress on lowering the skyrocketing cost of prescriptions for seniors without giving the federal government actual power to bring down prices.”

“Big Pharma charges more because it can,” said Stabenow. “We need to harness the bargaining power of millions of seniors to lower drug costs for people in Michigan and across the country.”

“Congress must act immediately to lower the cost of prescription drugs, and we should start with my bill to allow Medicare to negotiate the price of prescription drugs,” said Klobuchar, “The Medicare Part D program is one of the largest drug purchasers in the country—it makes no sense that a program representing 43 million seniors who need access to affordable medication is restricted from negotiating the best deal with drug manufacturers. Americans deserve a better deal, and this bill would be a huge first step towards lowering the cost of prescription drugs.”

“At the end of the day, President Trump’s talk is cheap, and prescription drugs are still far too expensive,” said Murray. “Letting Medicare use its sway to negotiate lower drug prices is one of the most important steps we can take to tackle high drug costs, so if Republicans really want to show people they take this issue seriously, it’s time they join Democrats in pushing for this.”

“Like many Americans, I have faced high prescription drug costs for critical medication,” said John Glaser, an 80-year-old resident of Alexandria, VA who has diabetes. “Medicare should be allowed to negotiate lower prices for seniors like me.”

“Pharmacists are a vital part of any community, providing medications and patient care services that improve health,” said Brian Hose, Pharm.D. and owner of Sharpsburg Pharmacy in Sharpsburg, MD. “We want solutions to lower prescription drug prices to ensure seniors get the best deal for their medications at the pharmacy counter.”

In advance of any Senate consideration of prescription drug pricing legislation, the Senators made it clear that Medicare should be able to use its own purchasing power to negotiate lower drug prices. The Medicare Modernization Act of 2003, which created the Medicare Part D program, included a provision banning the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services from negotiating prices with pharmaceutical companies. This effectively prevents Medicare from harnessing the bargaining power of nearly 43 million seniors enrolled in Medicare Part D.

According to a 2016 study by AARP, Medicare could have saved $14.4 billion on just 50 drugs if the program had paid the same prices as the Department of Veterans Affairs, which is allowed to bargain for better prices. Over 92 percent of voters support allowing Medicare to negotiate for lower prescription drug prices.

The full text of Murphy’s remarks is below:

“Thank you very much Patty, thank you to Senator Stabenow for joining us here today and Senator Klobuchar for her longtime leadership on this issue. You know, modern warfare always involves disinformation campaigns, and this administration has been waging a war on American health care consumers since the day they showed up, they have been engaged in a campaign to sabotage people’s health care, to disrupt insurance markets, to try to cause as much confusion and heartbreak as possible. Over two million people have lost their insurance since President Trump took office.

“The disinformation campaign is the rhetoric that the president uses to try to make it sound as if he cares about the issue of drug pricing. He’s talked over and over again about the importance of directly negotiating with the drug companies, he claims that there’s $300 billion worth of savings. And yet, he has done nothing to try to actually make that happen, he has done nothing to push Congressional Republicans and daily allies of the drug industry to do something about the exorbitant cost that we all pay for drugs that is unnecessary. And so we are here once again today to beg our Congressional Republican colleagues to join with us to stop the Trump administration’s sabotage of the health care system, to stop their lawsuit to try to unwind the entirety of the Affordable Care Act and to join with us on real pricing reform, not cosmetic pricing reform, not pricing reform in press releases, but pricing reform that really makes a big difference.

“Lastly, before I introduce my good friend Max, I want to just tell you about a little dial I did into the drug companies profit numbers from the third quarter of last year. In the third quarter of last year, there were [10] drug companies that had over $1 billion in profit. That’s a lot of profit for one company to make, never mind [10] different drug companies. And when you look at the entirety of the health care industry, in the third quarter of last year, 65 percent of the profits made by the entire health care industry were made by the drug industry. The drug industry can contribute to the wellbeing of seniors and American citizens by helping bring down these costs. And if they’re not willing to help, then we need to use all the tools at our disposal, and one of them is the direct negotiation of drug prices.

The National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare has been on the front lines, the very front lines of fighting for seniors and Medicare and Social Security recipients all across this country for decades. I know about it because my former Congressman Barbara Kennelly was at the center of that effort for a long time.”

 

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