U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders, independent from Vermont, speaks during a People's Action rally, protesting pharmaceutical companies' lobbying against allowing Medicare to negotiate lower prices for prescription drugs, in front of the headquarters of the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA) in Washington, DC, September 21, 2021.
Saul Loeb | AFP | fake images
The executive directors of merck and Johnson and Johnson have voluntarily agreed to testify at an upcoming Senate hearing about high drug prices in the United States, Sen. Bernie Sanders announced Friday, as lawmakers step up efforts to rein in health care costs for Americans.
The Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee hearing is scheduled for February 8 at 10 a.m. ET.
The panel had planned to vote on subpoenaing J&J CEO Joaquin Duato and Merck CEO Robert Davis to testify after both executives declined earlier requests to appear at the hearing. Those subpoenas would have been the first issued by the committee since 1981.
Meanwhile, Bristol-Myers Squibb CEO Chris Boerner and another unnamed pharmaceutical CEO accepted initial invitations to testify.
The panel will ask each executive to provide testimony about why their companies charge substantially higher prices for drugs in the United States than in other countries. The push to lower drug prices is one of the rare issues that has united the two major political parties in recent years, although they have often endorsed different approaches to achieving it.
Sanders, who chairs the Senate Health panel, noted that the three companies make some of the most expensive drugs sold in the U.S., including Merck's diabetes drug Januvia, blood cancer treatment Imbruvica from J&J and Bristol Myers Squibb's blood thinner Eliquis.
Those three treatments will be subject to the first round of Medicare drug price negotiations, a key policy under President Joe Biden's Inflation Reduction Act that aims to make expensive drugs more affordable for old people. J&J, Merck and Bristol Myers Squib are suing to stop the talks, which will set new prices that will take effect in 2026.
“I very much hope that the CEOs of these major pharmaceutical companies will take a serious look at these incredible price discrepancies and work with us to substantially reduce the prices they charge the American people for these and other prescription drugs,” Sanders said in a statement. Friday.
In a statement, a Merck spokesperson said, “We are confident that this will be a productive hearing aimed at improving the committee's understanding of the pharmaceutical industry and finding common-sense solutions to the challenges patients face.”
The company had offered its American president as a witness, arguing that official was better equipped to answer questions about drug prices, according to the spokesman. But the committee refused.
A J&J spokesperson said the company hopes to “gain an understanding of our long-standing efforts to improve affordability and access to medicines.”
Last year, the Senate Health Committee similarly heard testimony from the CEOs of modern, Eli Lilly, Nordisk and sanafi about high drug prices.
