Price Controls Could Prevent the Next 'Miracle Drug'

REALCLEARHEALTH

The death rate from cancer in the United States has fallen by more than one-third since 1991. HIV-related mortality has dropped ninefold since 1995. Death rates for Alzheimer's, chronic respiratory diseases, and stroke have all declined in recent years, too.

These gains didn't happen by accident. They're the result of decades of medical innovation -- from antiretroviral therapy drugs to breakthrough cancer treatments -- that have helped people live longer, healthier lives.

These pharmaceutical breakthroughs have delivered enormous value beyond the bedside. By preventing hospitalizations, reducing complications, and enabling people to remain productive for longer, new medicines and treatments generate broadly shared benefits for society and the economy.

Now, some lawmakers are putting that progress at risk by trying to give the government more power over drug prices.

That's a mistake. High drug prices are not a market failure. They are what make high-risk, high-reward medical innovations possible.

Developing a single new medicine can take more than a decade and cost billions of dollars. In 2025, large pharmaceutical companies invested $159 billion in research and development. Small and mid-sized biotechs have invested hundreds of billions more.

Most experimental drugs fail -- nine in 10, according to researchers. The vitality of the entire biotech sector depends on the possibility that the returns from a small number of successes will cover the total capital costs that include the financial losses associated with the many dead ends along the way.

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