Sanders threatens to block Biden NIH nominee over prescription drug price plan
Gabrielle M. Etzel
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Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) has said he will not move forward on any health agency nominee from the Biden administration until the president announces a plan to lower prescription drug prices.
Sanders, the chairman of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, told the Washington Post in an interview that he expects the administration to provide “a very clear strategy” on drug prices before he moves forward with the confirmation process of the new head of the National Institutes of Health, Dr. Monica Bertagnolli.
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Bertagnolli is the current director of the National Cancer Institute and has been instrumental in Biden’s Cancer Moonshot initiative, which aims to halve the cancer death rate by 2047. The president called Bertagnolli “a world-class physician-scientist” in his announcement of her nomination last month, saying her “leadership will ensure NIH continues to be an engine of innovation to improve the health of the American people.”
The Democratic majority on the HELP Committee issued a memo on Monday analyzing the cost of prescription drug prices that were at least in part developed by NIH funding and research.
“The average (median) price of new treatments that NIH scientists helped to invent over the past twenty years is $111,000,” according to the HELP memo.
The report says Congress appropriated $53.9 billion for biomedical research and development for fiscal 2023, $47.5 billion of which went to the NIH.
The Democratic majority on the committee also noted that American drug prices are notoriously higher than other nations with comparable standards of living despite taxpayer investment into drug creation.
“U.S. taxpayers should never pay more than what people in other wealthy countries pay for the drugs taxpayers helped develop,” argued Senate Democrats.
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Sanders told the Washington Post he thinks the NIH is in good hands with acting Director Lawrence Tabak but that policy change on prescription drug prices is critical.
“Politicians for years have talked about the high cost of prescription drugs,” Sanders said, “relatively little has been done, and it’s time that we act decisively.”