DC Journal: IRA Anniversary Is a Reminder to Focus on Real Campaign Issues
By Kasia Mulligan, Patients Come First’s National Spokesperson
While the last month has been roiled by unprecedented political turmoil, with less than 90 days before the election, pressing policy issues are unfortunately not making the headlines. Covering breaking political news is imperative. However, Americans still want to know what will be done to address fundamental concerns affecting their lives, especially going into November.
The Inflation Reduction Act is one of the most consequential pieces of legislation enacted during the Biden administration two years ago. While the bill set out to do many things, implementing new government price-setting rules for prescription medications was the chief significant healthcare policy change since the passage of the Affordable Care Act in 2010.
As the IRA’s second anniversary rolls around, Americans can see that government-imposed price controls are a step in the wrong direction. Now that government bureaucrats can dictate prices for medications as early as seven years after Food and Drug Administration approval, the disturbance in the delicate research and development ecosystem is apparent, as evidenced by a House Committee on Ways & Means fact sheet listing examples of halted research for cancer drugs and other therapies.
Heavy-handed government intervention discourages investments in desperately needed medical research and development, ultimately stifling innovation to the detriment of patients looking for cures. Innovators have made great strides in developing drugs and therapies in recent decades. However, many chronic illnesses and rare diseases still lack a cure or advanced treatment to alleviate their toughest effects.
These patients are desperately waiting for innovations to reach the market. For the private sector to invest the time and resources needed to produce new treatments, it must be confident that it will recover its investment. The specter of the government swooping in and arbitrarily determining how much companies can charge for their products is enough to diminish significantly research and development spending, estimated at 254 fewer drug approvals — a 44.6 percent decrease in the innovation pipeline.
In addition to the stifling price controls, systemic changes to the IRA are hurting patients most at risk. These changes include increasing patients’ out-of-pocket costs for medicines, spiking insurance premiums, and limiting Medicare Part D plans.
Voters would do best to remember that this misguided price-setting system is just the latest example of how government actions can create barriers to care. It is certainly not the only one. Other forces are also working to deter medical innovation, especially the growing burden of mass tort litigation.
The explosion of mass tort claims in recent years has forced many enterprises to shift resources toward defending themselves in court — often against meritless charges — and away from research and development efforts. For all but the biggest players in the healthcare system, they can choose to pay for lawyers or scientists — not both.
Debates over a complicated government price-setting regime and dry legal issues might not generate as many clicks as other election stories or memes, but addressing those issues could help millions of people waiting for treatments. Every moment we spend focused on dramatic moments and intriguing stories is a missed opportunity to discuss how we can improve the quality of healthcare for those most in need.
Read the full op-ed in DC Journal here.