In a recent campaign stop in California, President Joe Biden said that people in other countries are paying 40-60% less than what Americans are paying for prescription drugs. A fact-checker recently approved his claim, affirming that Americans are indeed paying double for prescription drugs compared to prices in other countries.

“If I put you on Air Force One with me, and you have a prescription—no matter what it’s for, minor or major—and I flew you to Toronto or flew to London or flew you to Brazil or flew you anywhere in the world, I can get you that prescription filled for somewhere between 40 to 60% less than it costs here,” Biden said at a Feb. 22 campaign reception in Los Altos, California, where he was joined by Vice President Kamala Harris.

WLRN, which can be found on 91.3 FM in Florida, partnered with PolitiFact to fact-check politicians and the claims that they make while on the campaign trail. Biden’s comments last month were ranked “mostly true” by fact-checkers, reports WUWF, and NPR member station.

Biden then cited provisions in the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act to lower prescription drug prices, including capping insulin at $35 per month for Medicare enrollees. Lawmakers also put a limit on older Americans’ out-of-pocket prescription costs to $2,000 per year starting in 2025. 

The law also authorizes Medicare to negotiate prices directly with drug makers for 10 prescription drugs, and the list is expected to grow.

There’s a growing body of evidence to suggest that overall, U.S. prescription drug prices are significantly higher, sometimes two to four times, compared with prices in other industrialized nations. Generic drugs, however, are an anomaly and are typically cheaper in the U.S. compared with other countries. 

A recent study by Rand found that across all drugs, U.S. prices were 2.78 times higher than prices in 33 other countries, based on 2022 data. The divide was largest for brand-name drugs, with U.S. prices averaging 4.22 times higher than those in the other nations. After adjusting for manufacturer-funded rebates, U.S. prices for brand-name drugs remained more than three times higher than prices in other countries. 

“The analysis used manufacturer gross prices for drugs because net prices—the amounts ultimately retained by manufacturers after negotiated rebates and other discounts are applied—are not systematically available,” a press release about the report said.

A series of other studies show that in the U.S., people are paying more than any other peer countries for brand-name drugs, and it’s not offset enough by generic drug prices.

Drug patents and exclusivity are other factors keeping U.S. drug prices higher than in other countries.

Other Politicians Agree Prescription Drug Costs Are Too High

Last February, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont) issued a report slamming the U.S. prices of drugs and executive pay of three major drug manufacturers—Johnson & Johnson (J&J), Merck, and Bristol Myers Squibb—just before a hearing.

The CEOs of all three drug manufacturers had to appear before a hearing to be grilled by Sanders, prepared by staff associated with the U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP Committee). The New York Times reports that they testified on their behalf Feb. 8, telling their side of the story.

Americans pay the most for life-saving drugs compared to other countries, the senator’s report summarized—by far. In some cases, Americans are paying nearly 10 times the price as what Germans pay. Sanders’ detailed report outlines how the three companies are spending more on executive pay and stock buybacks than drug research and development (R&D).

“The United States pays, by far, the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs,” the report reads, written by staff and headed by Sanders as Chair. “At a time when one out of four Americans cannot afford the medicine their doctors prescribe, ten large pharmaceutical companies made over $112 billion in profits in 2022 while paying their chief executives exorbitant compensation packages and spending billions of dollars on stock buybacks and dividends to make their wealthy stockholders even richer.”

Sens. Maggie Hassan (D-NH) and Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) voted last July to advance a bipartisan bill she personally helped develop to reduce the rocketing cost of prescription drugs and the way pharmacy managers benefit from rising drug prices. 

The Modernizing and Ensuring PBM Accountability (MEPA) Act, which passed the Finance Committee July 26 on a bipartisan basis, reduces the cost incentive for pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) to prioritize more expensive drugs because they receive higher payouts for higher priced drugs.

The MEPA Act would scale back incentives to jack up prescription drug prices at pharmacies. The legislation shows that lawmakers understand change is needed regarding sky-high drug prices.

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On Monday, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) joined the Pod Save America podcast and revealed who her “dream blunt rotation” would be when asked. It was hypothetical, as she doesn’t smoke, and the senator kept things positive in her responses.

In what they called a special President’s Day edition episode Feb. 19, Pod Save America co-host Jon Favreau (the former Barack Obama staffer, not the MCU actor) asked her about her push to deschedule pot, and also who she’s most and least likely to invite to a blunt rotation out of a list of pre-selected choices. 

The list of choices for the “dream blunt rotation” included politicians like President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, and Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), as well as celebrities like Snoop Dogg, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, and Taylor Swift.

Warren played along, not keeping things too serious, revealing that she could only pick one person for her dream rotation. “I’m just doing The Rock four times,” she said, laughing.

When Favreau asked about her “nightmare blunt rotation,” she was given the choices of her perceived opponents: Elon Musk, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell, and Mark Zuckerberg. 

Warren declined to answer, keeping things classy.   

“I’m starting to feel a little sick,” she laughed. “That is really awful to contemplate.”

Earlier in the conversation, Favreau also asked her about a more serious topic—her recent push to deschedule cannabis, joining several other lawmakers. 

“You and other Democratic senators recently asked the Biden administration to remove marijuana from the Controlled Substances Act—entirely—which would decriminalize it on a federal level. Have you heard back from DOJ or the DEA, or had any conversations with the administration about this?

“DEA?” She asked. “We’re pushing on them now. I want them to deschedule marijuana altogether. Look, if the Republicans didn’t block us, we’d run this through Congress. You just legalize it.

“There still could be regulations around it like there is around alcohol—you’ve got to be a certain age, you got to have certain disclosures about the potency and so on, I’m all for that,” Warren said. “But I really want to say to the DEA: Guys, come on. It is not 1958, and we don’t need to be terrified of this stuff. Let’s just deschedule it and go forward.” 

Pod Save America is hosted by former Obama aides Favreau, along with Jon Lovett, Dan Pfeiffer, and Tommy Vietor.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s Push to Deschedule

During an appearance on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, Warren discussed the push to deschedule cannabis fully rather than moving it from Schedule I to Schedule III of the Controlled Substances Act.

“Right now marijuana is scheduled, it’s called, as a drug by the DEA at the same risk as heroin,” Warren said. “And that means not only is it illegal, you can’t even do research on it. It’s, so no—and what we’re saying in this letter is, ‘Guys get with it,’ at the DEA. It’s not 1954. More than half of all states have legalized marijuana.”

In a letter led by Warren and Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA), along with nine other Democrats including U.S. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) among others. 

The letter urges the DEA and Biden administration to deschedule cannabis altogether, recognizing that rescheduling to Schedule III would be a “significant step forward” but would not resolve the “worst harms of the current system.”

“Thus, the DEA should deschedule marijuana altogether. Marijuana’s placement in the CSA has had a devastating impact on our communities and is increasingly out of step with state law and public opinion,” the legislators said in the letter dated Jan. 30.

Warren routinely calls for a just and equitable cannabis industry. But the biggest change possible would be removing cannabis entirely from the list of controlled substances.

Biden could use a boost this upcoming general election, given what’s at stake. A January survey, conducted by Lake Research Partners, revealed a number of key findings surrounding registered voters and attitudes surrounding cannabis, namely that Biden could boost his favorability by 11% among younger voters should cannabis move from Schedule I to Schedule III.

The survey demonstrated the support behind rescheduling cannabis, with 58% of participants showing support and 19% opposed. Researchers wrote that support also crossed most demographic lines, and no more than one-third of voters in any major subgroup was opposed to rescheduling. Young voters, those aged 18-25, showed the strongest levels of support for rescheduling at 65%, with nearly half indicating they felt strongly about the issue. Support was strong across age demographics, with seniors showing support by a double-digit margin.

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Tuesday, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont) issued a report slamming the U.S. prices of drugs and executive pay of three major drug manufacturers—Johnson & Johnson (J&J), Merck, and Bristol Myers Squibb—just before a Feb. 8 hearing.

Thursday the CEO’s of all three drug manufacturers had to appear before a hearing to be grilled by Sanders, prepared by staff associated with the U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP Committee). The New York Times reports that they testified on their behalf Feb. 8, telling their side of the story.

Americans, hands down, pay the most for life-saving drugs compared to other countries, the senator’s report summarized. In some cases, Americans are paying nearly 10 times the price as what Germans pay. Sanders’ detailed report outlines how the three companies are spending more on executive pay and stock buybacks than drug research and development (R&D).

“The United States pays, by far, the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs,” the report reads, written by staff and headed by Sanders as Chair. “At a time when one out of four Americans cannot afford the medicine their doctors prescribe, ten large pharmaceutical companies made over $112 billion in profits in 2022 while paying their chief executives exorbitant compensation packages and spending billions of dollars on stock buybacks and dividends to make their wealthy stockholders even richer.”

If you’re an American on the life-saving cancer drug Keytruda, you’re paying more than twice the amount that citizens in Germany—a highly industrialized nation—pay out of pocket. Merck began selling Keytruda in 2015 at an annual cost of $147,000 in the U.S. and $132,000 in Germany. 

Keytruda now costs $89,000 annually in Germany, but $191,000 in the U.S. In Japan, Ketruda costs $44,000 annually, which is less than one-fourth of what Americans pay. The drug Eliquis, which prevents strokes, costs $770 annually in Germany but $7,100 in the U.S.—nearly 10 times as much.

“The current industry business model is based on ripping off the American people,” the report reads. “For some of their most popular drugs, Johnson & Johnson, Merck, and Bristol Myers Squibb made more money in the U.S. than the rest of the world combined.

Report’s Key Findings

The report includes a few key findings: In 2022, Johnson & Johnson made $17.9 billion in profits and its CEO received $27.6 million in compensation. J&J spent $17.8 billion that same year on stock buybacks, dividends, and executive compensation, compared to just $14.6 billion on R&D). 

“In other words, the company spent $3.2 billion more enriching executives and stockholders than finding new cures,” the report reads. 

In 2022, Bristol Myers Squibb made $6.3 billion in profits and its former CEO made $41.4 million in compensation. Bristol Myers Squibb spent $12.7 billion the same year on stock buybacks, dividends, and executive compensation, compared to just $9.5 billion on R&D. “Just like Johnson & Johnson, Bristol Myers Squibb spent $3.2 billion more enriching executives and stockholders than finding new cures,” the report reads. 

In 2022, Merck made $14.5 billion in profits and its CEO made $52.5 million in compensation. That year, the company spent over $7 billion on dividends and executive compensation, and $13.6 billion on R&D. 

“If Merck’s cancer drug Keytruda was its own company, its 2022 sales would rival McDonald’s annual revenue, and exceed the revenue of the hotel chain Marriott,” it reads.

Other Attempts to Limit Drug Manufacturers

Senators have introduced bills to hold pharmaceutical drug companies accountable for pricing as well as other related practices.

One angle to lower the cost of drugs has been bills that aim to reduce the cost incentive for pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) to prioritize more expensive drugs because they receive higher payouts for higher priced drugs.

In September 2023 Senate Finance Committee Chair Ron Wyden, (D-Oregon), and Ranking Member Mike Crapo, (R-Idaho) introduced the Modernizing and Ensuring PBM Accountability (MEPA) Act, a bill to brings more transparency, accountability and competition to pharmacy benefit manager practices in the pharmaceutical supply .

Sen. Menendez (D-New Jersey), a senior member of the U.S. Senate Committee on Finance, said the Modernizing and Ensuring PBM Accountability (MEPA) Act includes his own inclusion, the Patients Before Middlemen (PBM) Act.

HIV drugmaker Gilead Sciences was slammed for its PBM Express Scripts because it jacked up the prices of its lifesaving hepatitis C cures Sovaldi and Harvoni. But Gilead later changed its tune and joined a chorus of drugmakers—turning on PBMs.

With the committee hearing Thursday, Sen. Bernie hopes to hold accountable the companies spending the least on drug development and the most on executive kickbacks.

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Sen. Bernie Sanders is once again keeping drug makers in check, suggesting that people living with cancer are being preyed on by greedy interests.

On Monday, Sanders demanded a Department of Health-led investigation into a proposal to grant a company with an exclusive patent license for cancer treatment and methods, produced with public resources and a potential conflict of interest.

The sexually transmitted infection Human papillomavirus (HPV) can lead to six types of cancer and most cervical cancer, the National Cancer Institute (NCI) reports. It can be dormant for years or cause genital warts or worse. Last month, National Institutes of Health (NIH) proposed granting Kingston, New Jersey-based Scarlet TCR a patent for a T-cell therapy for HPV, which has undergone a Phase I trial and has a Phase II trial scheduled to conclude in 2025.

There’s no cure for HPV, but drug developers are examining T-cell therapies to combat HPV and the cancers it leads to, including Scarlet TCR. Sometimes they’re gene-engineered. (CBD is also being explored for its potential to inhibit cervical cancer cells.) 

There’s a problem though. The patent proposal and the company’s ties to an ex-government employee and other inconsistencies were revealed in an Oct. 18 report by The American Prospect. The NIH quietly applied to be granted “an exclusive patent for a cancer drug, potentially worth hundreds of millions or even billions of dollars, to an obscure company staffed by one of its former employees,” The American Prospect reports.

Sanders, chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee, demanded a probe of the patent proposal in an Oct. 23 letter to Christi Grimm, who is inspector general of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The HELP committee also announced Sander’s open letter on Oct. 23.

Sanders suggested the NIH is allowing a company to take advantage of a life-saving cancer drug.

“I am growing increasingly alarmed that not only has the NIH abdicated its authority to ensure that the new drugs it helps develop are reasonably priced, it may actually be exceeding its authority to grant monopoly licenses to pharmaceutical companies that charge the American people, by far, the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs,” Sanders wrote. “One particularly egregious example has recently been brought to my attention that I believe demands your immediate attention.”

Sanders argued that the NIH should be doing more to lower the cost of drug therapy.

“There does not appear to be anything reasonable and necessary about granting a monopoly for a treatment that was invented, manufactured and tested by the NIH, is already in late stage trials and could potentially enrich a former NIH employee who was one of the major government researchers of this treatment,” Sanders wrote. “Based on current law and the best interest of U.S. taxpayers who paid for this cancer therapy, it would seem to make more sense for the NIH to offer non-exclusive licenses so that multiple manufacturers can produce this important cancer therapy at reasonable and affordable prices. The apparent abuse of the system by the NIH with respect to the exclusive patent license for this cancer therapy is so egregious that it has been characterized as a ‘how-to-become-a-billionaire program run by the NIH.’”

“If accurate,” Sanders wrote, “that would be absolutely unacceptable. The NIH should be doing everything within its authority to lower the outrageously high price of prescription drugs. It should not be granting a monopoly on a promising taxpayer-funded therapy that could cost hundreds of thousands of dollars for cancer patients in a way that appears to exceed its statutory authority.”

The American Prospect story pointed out that the NIH offering an exclusive license for a cancer treatment to a company with no website or SEC filings staffed by a former NIH employee

More Ethical Drug Research

There is historical precedence on life-saving drugs or therapies that didn’t need a patent: On Jan. 23, 1923, Sir Frederick G. Banting, James B. Collip, and Charles Best, discoverers of insulin, were awarded U.S. patents on insulin and the methods used. They all sold these patents to the University of Toronto for $1 each. Banting said, “Insulin does not belong to me, it belongs to the world.” 

While things have changed and the price of insulin skyrocketed, new efforts are being made by the drug’s top three makers to make insulin affordable once again.

When the polio vaccine was found to be 90% effective, its discoverer wasn’t in it for the money. On April 12, 1955, Edward R. Murrow asked Jonas Salk who owned the patent to the polio vaccine. “Well, the people, I would say,” Salk responded. “There is no patent. Could you patent the sun?”

In today’s pharmaceutical world, some of those values are lost.

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Bernie Sanders took Ted Cruz to task over his podcast comments about baristas and bongs. Find out more about Cruz’s misguided musings.

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In an interview with Killer Mike, TMZ reports that the rapper expressed his desire to see more action on the part of Biden and his administration, which recently commuted 75 sentences and pardoned three people. An unnamed TMZ reporter caught Killer Mike at an airport for a brief question about his thoughts on the subject while they walked.

“I think we can always do better,” Killer Mike said. “I think as many as we are letting out, we probably should quadruple that. I think that beyond that, that should be a priority for non-violent drug offenders in terms of marijuana and things like that. They should have first bids at licensing.”

The interviewer inquired about the need for justice, and Killer Mike presented what needs to be done. “I think they should get first priority to get the state license and beyond. I think the feds owe them that. I think that that’s the way you truly repent for a drug war gone terribly wrong.

“I think the oligarchy in this country owes the people who this industry’s been built on, that’s going to bring billions to this country,” he continued. “All the people that were outlaws that paved the way.”

On April 26, President Joe Biden announced that he would be commuting the sentences of 75 people, and issuing three pardons. “Today, I am pardoning three people who have demonstrated their commitment to rehabilitation and are striving every day to give back and contribute to their communities. I am also commuting the sentences of 75 people who are serving long sentences for non-violent drug offenses, many of whom have been serving on home confinement during the COVID-pandemic—and many of whom would have received a lower sentence if they were charged with the same offense today, thanks to the bipartisan First Step Act.” Biden also stated that his administrations would continue to “…review clemency petitions and deliver reforms that advance equity and justice, provide second chances, and enhance the wellbeing and safety of all Americans.”

While it’s a welcome decision, as people of the industry have eagerly awaited Biden and his administration to make a positive move for those who were wrongfully convicted of cannabis crimes, many believe it’s not enough.

Advocates such as Leo Bridgewater, who is an army war veteran, longstanding cannabis advocate, and National Director of Heart Community Capital and Minorities for Medical Marijuana, believes that Biden’s move barely scratches the surface. “Setting them free is not the end all be all. Allowing them to be the first to market business entrepreneurs in their communities would be proper restitution,” he wrote on Instagram. Bridgewater was recently named one of the most influential people in the cannabis industry in the High Times 100.

Killer Mike has long been a vocal advocate of ending the War on Drugs. In 2016, he wrote an article in Rolling Stone explaining how the U.S. can right these wrongs. “As marijuana reform begins to de-escalate the drug war, creating new opportunities for employment and entrepreneurship in the process, it is imperative that the people most in need of a second chance actually get one,” Killer Mike wrote. “The price they have already paid for our failed drug policy is steep enough.”

In 2015, Killer Mike sat down to ask Bernie Sanders questions in a six-part video series that spanned topics such as economic freedom, social justice, free health care, and more. In part four, they discussed the War on Drugs and prison reform.

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It’s a great stump speech crowd-pleaser. But can a president actually make it happen? It’s complicated.

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Now its Biden v. Sanders. One boosted the war on drugs, the other wants to end it.

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