Every Democratic member of the US Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) has signed letters inviting CEOs from major pharmaceutical companies headquartered in New Jersey— Johnson & Johnson, Merck, and Bristol Myers Squibb —to testify before the committee on the outrageously high cost of prescription drugs.
The hearing, titled “Why Does the United States Pay, By Far, The Highest Prices In The World For Prescription Drugs?”, is scheduled to take place on Thursday, January 25, 2024 at 10 a.m. ET.
“Here are some of the questions that the American people would like answers to,” the senators wrote in their letter inviting the pharmaceutical CEOs to testify in the HELP Committee.
“Why does the United States pay, by far, the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs?,” the senators wrote. “How does it happen that one out of four Americans cannot afford to take the medicine their doctors prescribe while prescription drug companies make billions in profits and pay their executives exorbitant compensation packages? How does it happen that the median price of new prescription drugs in the United States was over $220,000 last year, while the pharmaceutical industry spent billions on stock buybacks and dividends?”
Johnson & Johnson, Merck, and Bristol Myers Squibb all sell some of the most expensive and widely prescribed drugs in the U.S. relative to the price of those drugs in other countries.
For example, Merck sells Januvia, a drug for diabetes, for $6,000 in the U.S. compared to just $900 in Canada and $200 in France.
Johnson & Johnson sells Imbruvica, a drug for blood cancer, for $204,000 in the U.S. compared to just $46,000 in the U.K. and $43,000 in Germany. Bristol Myers Squibb sells Eliquis, a blood thinner, for $6,700 in the U.S. compared to just $900 in Canada and $650 in France.
In 2022, Johnson & Johnson made $17.9 billion in profit and its CEO, Joaquin Duato, received $27.6 million in compensation.
That same year, Merck made $14.5 billion in profit and its CEO, Robert Davis, made $52.5 million in compensation; while Bristol Myers Squibb made $6.3 billion in profits and its former CEO, Giovanni Caforio, made $41.4 million in compensation.
“The American people have a right to know why it is that they pay, by far, the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs while the pharmaceutical industry in the U.S. makes hundreds of billions in profits and pays their CEOs tens of millions of dollars in compensation,” said HELP Chairman Bernie Sanders.
“I look forward to hearing from the CEOs of large pharmaceutical companies directly on this critical issue. I also look forward to working with my colleagues in the Senate to lower the outrageously high price of prescription drugs,” said Sanders. “A life-saving drug is not effective if the patient who needs that drug cannot afford it.”
The HELP committee members who endorsed the letters are Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Patty Murray (D-Wash.), Bob Casey (D-Pa.), Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.), Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), Tim Kaine (D-Va.), Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.), Tina Smith (D-Minn.), Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.), John Hickenlooper (D-Colo.), and Ed Markey (D-Mass.).
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