Fact Sheet: President Donald J. Trump Announces Actions to Lower Prescription Drug Prices

Fact Sheets

TLDR

This executive order aims to reduce prescription drug prices through Medicare negotiation improvements, standardized care location payments, steep discounts for low-income patients (especially on insulin and epinephrine), state drug importation facilitation, increased generic availability, and pharmaceutical benefit manager reforms. It criticizes the previous administration while building on the current administration’s first-term efforts.

This fact sheet outlines an executive order on prescription drug pricing. It claims to build on his first term efforts with several key initiatives: enhancing Medicare drug price negotiations, standardizing payments regardless of care location, providing steep discounts for low-income patients (particularly for insulin and epinephrine), facilitating state drug importation programs, increasing generic drug availability, and addressing pharmaceutical benefit managers’ role as middlemen. The document frames these actions against the Biden-Harris administration, suggesting they failed to achieve projected savings from their Medicare Drug Pricing Negotiation Program.

The fact sheet presents several claims without specific implementation details:

  1. Medicare Drug Pricing Negotiation Program improvements: Claims to exceed 22% savings from first year, but doesn’t explain specific mechanisms for achieving this increase.

  2. Low-income medication pricing: Proposes dramatic price reductions (insulin to $0.03 plus fees, epinephrine to $15 plus fees) without clarifying funding mechanisms, eligibility criteria, or implementation timeline.

  3. Hospital drug acquisition costs: States hospitals acquire drugs at 35% less than government payment rates without providing evidence or addressing why this discrepancy exists.

  4. Care location payment standardization: Claims potential 60% price reductions through standardized payments regardless of care setting, but lacks details on implementation or potential unintended consequences.

  5. State importation programs: References facilitating drug importation without addressing FDA safety requirements, logistical challenges, or pharmaceutical industry resistance that has historically limited such programs.

  6. Previous achievements: Lists first-term accomplishments without quantifying impacts or acknowledging limitations of previous approaches.

  7. Middlemen reform: Identifies pharmaceutical benefit managers as problematic without specifying concrete reforms beyond improved fee disclosure.

The document uses political framing by criticizing the previous administration while presenting these initiatives as straightforward solutions to complex problems in pharmaceutical pricing.

LOWERING PRESCRIPTION DRUG PRICES: Today, President Donald J. Trump signed an Executive Order to expand on the historic efforts of his first term to lower prescription drug prices.

  • The Order directs the Department of Health and Human Services to take steps to significantly reduce drug prices for American patients.
  • It delivers lower drug prices for Medicare and the seniors who rely on it by:
    • Improving the Medicare Drug Pricing Negotiation Program in order to eclipse the 22% in savings achieved in the program’s first year.
    • Aligning Medicare payment for certain prescription drugs with the cost by which hospitals actually acquire them, which can be 35% lower than what the government currently pays.
    • Standardizing Medicare payments for prescription drugs, such as cancer treatments, regardless of where the patient receives care, which can lower prices by as much as 60%.
  • It provides massive discounts to low-income patients for life-saving medications.
    • Insulin prices for low-income patients and the uninsured will be lowered to as low as $0.03, plus a small administrative fee.
    • Injectable epinephrine for low-income patients and the uninsured will be as low as $15, plus a small administrative fee.
  • The Order helps states reduce drug prices by:
    • Facilitating importation programs that could save states millions in prescription drug costs.
    • Building off programs to help states get much better deals on expensive sickle-cell medications in Medicaid than the statutorily required 23.1% discount.

BRINGING RADICAL TRANSPARENCY AND COMPETITION TO PRESCRIPTION DRUG MARKETS: President Trump is dedicated to creating a transparent, competitive, and fair prescription drug market for American consumers.

  • President Trump has already taken numerous actions to end the practice of large corporations profiting by keeping health care prices and business practices hidden from Americans.

  • The Order increases the availability of generics and biosimilars, which can be as much as 80% cheaper than brand alternatives.

  • The Order builds off that critical work and reevaluates the role of middlemen by:

    • Improving disclosure of fees that pharmaceutical benefit managers (PBMs) pay to brokers for steering employers to utilize their services.
    • Directing the administration to develop reforms to promote a more competitive, transparent, efficient, and resilient prescription drug value chain.

  • By addressing the influence of middlemen and promoting open competition, President Trump’s actions aim to create a fairer prescription drug market that lowers costs and ensures accountability across the health care system.

PUTTING AMERICAN PATIENTS FIRST ONCE AGAIN: President Trump is delivering on his promise to once again put American patients first by building off of the historic efforts of his first term to lower prescription drug prices.

  • In his first term, President Trump took numerous actions that delivered real results for patients:
    • The Food and Drug Administration sped up development of lower-cost generic medicines and biosimilars as well as created a pathway for states to import lower cost drugs from Canada.
    • Government-mandated discounts were passed through to patients instead of being retained by middlemen.
    • Price transparency rules were developed to allow patients, doctors, and employers to see the actual cost of prescription drugs.
    • Insulin copays were capped for Medicare beneficiaries.
  • Unsurprisingly, the Biden-Harris Administration let many of these priorities languish while failing to even achieve the savings projected from the new Medicare Prescription Drug Negotiation Program.
  • President Trump will not stand for inaction, and his Administration is working rapidly to lower the cost of prescription drugs for Americans.