[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 30 (Thursday, March 8, 2001)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E317]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           PRESCRIPTION DRUGS

                                 ______
                                 

                        HON. JOHN J. DUNCAN, JR.

                              of tennessee

                    in the house of representatives

                        Thursday, March 8, 2001

  Mr. DUNCAN. Mr. Speaker, today I introduced a bill that will create 
incentives to reduce the price of prescription drugs for American 
consumers.
  As I travel around the Second Congressional District of Tennessee, I 
speak with many people. One concern I hear over and over again is the 
high cost of medications. Many seniors, in particular, often face a 
choice between things like medicine, food and heat.
  However, this problem is not isolated only to the elderly. All 
Americans face these steep prices. For example, single mothers and poor 
working families also have to buy medications. As a father, I cannot 
imagine anything worse than not being able to afford medicine for a 
sick child.
  As has been discussed many times, there are a lot of complex reasons 
that prices are so high, and it goes far beyond greedy manufacturers as 
some have suggested. I believe the primary culprit is a bloated federal 
bureaucracy that adds years and literally tens of millions of dollars 
to the development cost of new drugs.
  Some new drugs can cost more than a billion dollars to bring to 
market. In exchange, these drugs have a profound impact on the health 
of Americans and hundreds of millions of people worldwide. 
Fundamentally, we need to find ways to reduce these development costs.
  The second great inequity is that many countries have draconian cost 
controls. While these formularies may be sufficient to pay the price to 
physically produce a pill or medicine, they rarely take into account 
the phenomenal expenses that went into the development of the drug. 
These development costs are then shifted to a much smaller consumer 
base of consumers who end up paying outrageously high prices. If 
manufacturers and researchers were ever completely stripped of the 
ability to recover these costs, the flow of new drugs would slow 
dramatically, if not end completely.
  Nevertheless, it is wrong that Americans are so often asked to pay 
the price for drugs that benefit all mankind. It is particularly 
frustrating to consumers when they see our neighbors to the North and 
South paying much lower prices for exactly the same drug.
  I believe that this situation needs to be examined and addressed. In 
the meantime, my proposal would extend a new tax incentive to domestic 
manufacturers who could demonstrate that they are offering drugs to 
American consumers at the same average price the drugs are offered to 
citizens in Canada and Mexico. Hopefully this tax provision will 
strongly encourage drug makers to reduce their prices for average 
American consumers.
  American ingenuity is fueling the greatest health revolution in the 
history of mankind. We need to do everything possible to fulfill the 
promise of this research and alleviate suffering for everyone. However, 
American consumers deserve fair access to the products of our Nation's 
research engine, and I hope my legislation will encourage manufacturers 
to find innovative ways to reduce domestic prices or more equitably 
spread development costs among a larger base of consumers abroad.
  I urge my colleagues to support this bill and improve healthcare for 
all American consumers.

                          ____________________