Washington D.C. — House Energy and Commerce Committee Chair Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-WA) delivered the following opening remarks at today’s Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee hearing titled "At What Cost: Oversight of How the IRA's Price Setting Scheme Means Fewer Cures for Patients."

CRUSHING INNOVATION

“In many ways, this hearing feels like déjà vu.

“Just last Congress, we repeatedly warned that the Democrats’ drug pricing control scheme was going to do immense harm to patients by crushing drug innovation.

“Earlier this month, President Biden named the first ten drugs that will be subjected to CMS’s price controls in a big celebration at the White House.

“However, in the months and weeks leading up to President Biden’s announcement, we saw a steady stream of terrible news for patients in need of hope.

“One after another, company and after company started to issue announcements that began:

• ‘we are discontinuing phase 1’ trials for a promising blood cancer drug’
• ‘we will not launch a Phase III trial’ for a drug to treat Stargardt disease’
• ‘we are now carefully considering’ whether to seek ‘a second rare disease indication’
• ‘we will delay our launch’
• ‘we will not be seeking a second indication’
• ‘we are abandoning further investigation.’

“These announcements go on and on.

“We’ve catalogued over 24 such announcements since the IRA’s passage, and, with the list of the first ten drugs finally out, there are certain to be more.”

HURTING PATIENT ACCESS

“Each one of these doleful announcements represents a window of hope closing: hope for many patients, families, and caregivers.

“Americans rightly expect to have the earliest possible access to the most effective and innovative treatments and cures.

“We are a country of believers and American biomedical innovation gives people battling a disease or illness a fighting chance at life.

“This was the great bipartisan balance achieved by Hatch-Waxman.

“A framework that provided incentives to make massive private sector investments in research and development while allowing for competition to drive down prices after a drug had been on the market.

“Was it perfect? Of course not. Are there bad actors who abused patent protections and gamed the system? Absolutely.

“But it did ensure that Americans got cutting edge treatments and cures—sometimes years before people in other developed countries that have government price controls.

“I’m deeply concerned that—because of the so-called Inflation Reduction Act—the American people will not have the same fighting chance for a host of serious diseases.

“Instead, they will join people in so many other countries—like the UK and Canada, where unaccountable bureaucrats—not cutting-edge science—backed with entrepreneurial initiative—dictate the value of new cures.

“That’s why I’m looking forward to hearing from patient advocates and caregivers, like Mr. Crowley and Mr. John Czwartacki — individuals who are on the front lines.

“And from people, like Dr. Potts who have dedicated their lives to not just researching cancer but fighting it. 

“If there’s going to be a successful cancer moonshot it’s not going to be done by the National Institutes of Health or ARPA-H alone.

“The bulk of the work is going to have to be done by private industry innovators. People like Dr. Potts, who spend years and billions of dollars translating basic research into lifesaving treatments.”

CONSEQUENCES OF GOVERNMENT PRICE CONTROLS

“This brings me back to why this hearing is so important.

“Last Congress—with a bipartisan vote—this Committee stopped Speaker Pelosi’s government price controls in H.R. 3.

“Then, the so-called Inflation Reduction Act was passed on a party line vote through budget reconciliation.

“It short-circuited the hard bipartisan work of lowering drug prices for all Americans while preserving innovation.

“Instead, Democrats passed the buck to the Secretary of HHS and CMS and gave bureaucrats virtually unlimited discretion to dictate the price of a negotiation eligible drug.

“Congress’s failure to do the hard work has created a whole host of consequences.

“As Chairman Griffith mentioned, the drug price negotiation program is currently being challenged in court on constitutional grounds. We will see what the courts say, but I share Chairman Griffith’s belief that, at least, parts of it will likely be found unconstitutional.

“When that happens, this Committee will stand ready to do the hard work of building bipartisan solutions that lower drug prices without sacrificing innovation and America’s biomedical edge.

“I thank the witnesses again.”