For Immediate Release: May 16, 2019
Contact: Becca Rose, becca.rose@berlinrosen.
House Democrats Take Action to Protect Pre-Ex Protections and Hold Big Pharma Accountable
Washington, DC – Ahead of the House vote on the Strengthening Health Care and Lowering Prescription Drug Costs Act package to address prescription drug costs and remedy the Trump Administration’s sabotage of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), Health Care for America Now Executive Director Margarida Jorge released the following statement:
“This package is a welcome contrast to the health care proposals we saw over the past two years. Democrats are clearly listening to the voters that made health care the number one issue in the 2018 elections. Democrats are taking action to make health care more affordable and accessible for millions more people after two years of damaging actions from the Trump Administration and GOP that raised costs and left more people uninsured.
“Elected officials on both sides of the aisle have recognized the importance of reining in pharmaceutical corporations, and this prescription drug package is a good first step in combatting some of the Trump administration’s efforts to sabotage the ACA. This bill would restore funding that helps people sign up for insurance and ends the expansion of junk insurance plans that don’t cover basic health care needs.
“This is also an opportunity to get past lip service on lowering the cost of prescription drugs. There’s bipartisan support for some of these measures that leverage generic brands to lower costs, and we expect that every lawmaker will support this first step to make prescription medicine more affordable for those who need it. Prescription drug companies have been allowed to inflate prices and game the system long enough: politicians need to hold drug manufacturers accountable for putting life-saving medicine out of reach. The Trump administration and GOP talks a big game about taking on PhRMA’s price-gouging; Now is their chance to join Democrats in a bipartisan effort to take meaningful action in the right direction.
“Politicians must stop cowering to the will of drug manufacturers at every turn. We need policies that wrestle control of health care and drug prices out of the hands of big corporations and put consumers and patients in the driver’s seat. President Trump and his allies in Congress claim to care about Americans’ health care and making prescription drugs more affordable – now we’ll find out if that’s true.”
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Health Care for America Now (HCAN) is the national grassroots coalition that ran a $60 million five-and-a-half year campaign from 2008-2013 to pass, protect, and promote the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and protect Medicare and Medicaid. HCAN has come back together to fight the Republicans’ all-out effort to take away America’s health care and put people at the mercy of the health insurance companies again.
