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[Pages H3731-H3732]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
VOTE TO LOWER PRESCRIPTION DRUG COSTS
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from
Connecticut (Mr. Courtney) for 5 minutes.
Mr. COURTNEY. Mr. Speaker, about 6 months ago, this country went
through a historic election that shattered records that go back almost
100 years. It was the largest voter turnout for a midterm election
since 1914. It elected a new majority in the House of Representatives
by over 10 million votes.
If you drill down below those top lines, what you will see is that
the biggest driving issue for American voters, who turned up in record
numbers last November, was, in fact, the issue of healthcare.
If you drill down even further, what you will find is that the cost
of prescription drugs was the biggest concern that people had about the
security and stability of their healthcare. And why not?
Recent polling by Kaiser showed that 79 percent of Americans feel
that prescription drug prices are unreasonable. Eighty percent believe
that pharmaceutical company profits are to blame. One-third of
Americans said they haven't taken their medications as prescribed
because they have trouble affording it.
Again, the stories, in terms of the disparity of pricing in the U.S.
versus other parts of the civilized, developed world, are just rampant.
Obviously, we pay the highest prices here in this country, and the next
highest country, Switzerland, pays 25 percent less than U.S. patients
do for comparable medications.
This week, the new majority in the House of Representatives is going
to be taking up H.R. 987, the Strengthening Health Care and Lowering
Prescription Drug Costs Act, which we will be voting on either Thursday
or Friday. This bill, which listened to patients all across the country
and stakeholders who have been trying to endure these ridiculous costs,
will do a number of things.
Number one, it will end pay-for-delay, which will prohibit brand-drug
manufacturers from paying off generic companies that produce a
competing generic drug. In other words, they are maintaining their
exclusivity by paying off generic manufacturers, which are designed to
create a stronger marketplace and lower prices for American patients.
It also ends the practice of parking by generic drug companies.
Again, once you apply to the FDA for a generic drug, you can get 180
days where you exclude anyone else, any other generic manufacturer,
from competing with a similar medication.
The FDA has estimated that these practices cost American patients
$3.5 billion in higher drug costs every year.
We will be voting this week, finally, to stand up to special
interests, to listen to what experts and people who are close to this
market are telling us about ways of trying to widen the marketplace to
create more competition, and to, ultimately, lower the drug costs for
American patients that are killing State Medicaid budgets and are also
killing employer-based health plans. If you listen to what they are
saying, that is where the cost driving is the most acute.
This past week, in the State of Connecticut, Attorney General William
Tong announced a new lawsuit against generic manufacturers, which was
profiled on ``60 Minutes'' last Sunday night.
Mr. Tong demonstrated how they have smoking-gun evidence of price-
fixing amongst different drug companies. Forty-four States are joining
Connecticut in that effort.
It is time, whether it is the legislative branch of Congress or
whether it is a different branch, in the court systems, that we start
holding drug companies accountable.
The vote that is going to take place this week keeps faith with that
historic turnout last fall to make sure that we are going to get real
action to address the issue of healthcare.
Relief for Blue Water Navy Vietnam Veterans
Mr. COURTNEY. Mr. Speaker, we are also voting this week on H.R. 299--
it will be this evening--the Blue Water Navy Vietnam Veterans Act,
which will finally eliminate a 17-year barrier
[[Page H3732]]
for people who served in the sea services during the Vietnam conflict
and who are being denied access to VA benefits for the scourge of Agent
Orange illnesses.
Again, this is a process that has taken forever. We passed this
measure in the last Congress by unanimous vote. It was blocked from
consideration by two Senators last December.
Congratulations to Mark Takano, our new House Committee on Veterans'
Affairs chairman, for bringing up this bill immediately in the new
House of Representatives, to make sure that we get this long-overdue
justice for people who served in the Vietnam conflict taken care of.
Veterans service organizations that have been relentless in their
advocacy for blue water Vietnam veterans, such as The American Legion,
Veterans of Foreign Wars, Paralyzed Veterans of America, Disabled
American Veterans, Vietnam Veterans of America, AMVETS, MOAA, and
Military Order of the Purple Heart, are supporting this legislation.
It is going to be important for us to get this bill passed out of
this Chamber and force the Senate to do the right thing and provide
justice for those who served in that conflict and who are still
suffering from cancers, from heart disease, and from skin ailments
because of exposure to a chemical that they had absolutely no idea was
unsafe.
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