New Report Claims Reducing Drug Prices Will Not Impact Innovation, Discusses HTA Solution

Patients for Affordable Drugs released a report on how lowering drug prices would fail to impact innovation. The authors note that a balance between healthy pharma profits and reasonably priced drugs is possible. One solution to regulating high drug prices in the United States is the establishment of a health technology assessment (HTA) to determine costs. The authors also discuss how taxpayer-funded research contributes substantially to drug development, including the development of COVID-19 vaccines.

According to the report, “We’re advocating for a system that better balances fair prices and profit with innovation…In the United States, every drug approved by the FDA as safe and effective automatically comes to market. Virtually every other wealthy nation the world has another step post-approval called health technology assessment. The countries examine the actual value of the drug in order to settle on an appropriate price. Drug companies have blocked efforts to use this step in the United States, although many health policy experts think it would improve fair pricing, affordability, and accessibility for patients over the longer term.” Read more here.

(Source: Patients for Affordable Drugs, 2/3/21)