February 04, 2016

New Dem Rep. Bera's Statement on Letter Urging FDA to Reduce Drug Prices

Washington, DC – This month, Rep. Ami Bera and Rep. Scott Peters led nearly 30 New Dems in sending a letter to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) urging it to take key steps to help reduce drug prices.  Rep. Bera and Rep. Peters released the following statements:

“Americans should be able to access quality, affordable prescription medication,” Congressman Bera said. “Competition is critical to maintaining reasonable pricing and the backlog in generic drug applications, as well as the unintended consequences of the Unapproved Drugs Initiative, has created opportunities for some irresponsible drug companies to make a lot of money while Americans suffer. This is not acceptable. We urge the FDA to take these common sense steps to help increase competition and lower drug costs.”

“Making our generic drug approval process faster and more efficient will increase competition and provide consumers with more affordable options,” Congressman Peters said. “This is especially important to the long-term and critically ill who might be taken advantage of by companies like Turing and Valeant who choose to drive up prices because they know these patients don’t have anywhere else to turn for the medicine they need.”

The letter asks the agency to take two common sense steps to address loopholes that limit competition that permits some drug companies to charge exorbitant prices for generic drugs.

To view a copy of the letter, see here.



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