He was also the first congressman to take people over to Canada to buy medication (mostly for breast cancer).
Sanders said Congress should authorize the Department of Health and Human Services to negotiate drug prices with pharmaceutical companies to bring down costs for Medicare drug benefits. “We should use our buying power to get better deals for the American people. Other countries do it. Why don’t we?”
He said there should be tougher penalties for drug companies that commit fraud. “We should pass legislation which says that drug companies lose their government-backed monopoly on a drug if they are found guilty of fraud in the manufacture or sale of that drug,” Sanders said.
To encourage wider availability of more affordable generic drugs, Sanders said Congress should ban the practice of brand-name drugmakers paying potential competitors to keep lower-priced generic substitutes off the market. Brand-name drugs cost, on average, 10 times as much as generics.
Sanders also would lower barriers to the importation of lower-cost drugs from other countries. Sanders was the first member of Congress (1999) to take Americans to Canada to purchase a prescription breast cancer drug at a fraction of the cost charged in the United States for the same medicine.
Sanders and Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) are investigating dramatic recent hikes in the costs of many generic drugs. They introduced legislation this year that would force companies to pay rebates to the Medicaid program if generic prices grew faster than inflation.
Ultimately, Sanders said, Congress should uncouple research and development costs from drug prices by rewarding innovation with a prize.
Source:
http://www.sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/press-releases/stop-skyrocketing-drug-prices-sanders-says
Bill Source:
http://www.sanders.senate.gov/download/the-prescription-drug-affordability-act?inline=file
It comes as no surprise that Clinton has taken his ideas and proclaimed them as her own.
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