At a press briefing, Dr. Mehmet Oz, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator, celebrated President Trump's executive order on bringing down drug pricing.
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00:00Thank you Secretary Kennedy. This is the most powerful executive order on pharmacy pricing and health care ever in the history of our nation.
00:12And it's only happening because we have a president with the fortitude, the guts to stand up to the withering criticism and lobbying that's going to occur as soon as folks hear about the executive order.
00:24So on behalf of the child in Philadelphia who's got an autoimmune disease with a thousand dollar a month drug or the older woman in Los Angeles who's on a blood thinner who can't afford her copay, I want to thank President Trump.
00:37God bless you for having the guts to take on this industry. Thank you, sir.
00:41So let's talk about the details a little bit. And this is primarily about equalization, as President Trump said. It's about fairness.
00:49Think of NATO as a metaphor. When President Trump said you've got to pay a little more so it makes sense for all of us, they came up.
00:57And the European countries contributed. The same thing we believe will happen in this situation.
01:02Most people who have thought about this process agree that it is patently unfair to tolerate the numbers that Secretary Kennedy and President Trump have reflected to you.
01:11On this chart to my left is a list of the ten drugs that were negotiated in the IRA. Again, this is the bill, the law, that regulates a negotiation process.
01:22This is the best price that was able to be obtained by the Biden administration. And if you look at these numbers, they actually reflect how much on top of the most favored nation price was being paid by the United States.
01:36So the closest to me, Bobby, you can point to the Jardines, the closest one, 289%, the one that's closest to you. That means that we are paying in America four times more than that drug costs in other countries.
01:49Again, 100% is the baseline. It's 289% above that baseline. It goes all the way down to where we're paying 50% more than any other country. That's the range.
01:58As was pointed out by President Trump, half the time we're paying three times more than it's paid in other countries. It doesn't make any sense for the system.
02:06That stated, President Trump has over and over again indicated, and Secretary Kennedy has reflected as well, we want innovation.
02:12We want our technology partners doing the best they can to make the best solutions for drugs to cure as many people in America and around the world as possible.
02:20By getting our allies to pay a bit more, as they should be, and they should have for many years been doing, we'll course correct a problem that's gotten out of hand.
02:30And by doing that in a thoughtful, effective way, we're going to be able to get the pharmaceutical industry whole.
02:35Those jobs will still be here. We'll still be productive. We'll still be curing cancer and a slew of other ailments that plague humanity.
02:41America will still be the leader in this space, but we'll be paying the appropriate amount, the right-sized amount for those tasks.
02:48So over the next 30 days, the four of us up here, together with people standing in the back of this room,
02:54we're doing a lot of the heavy lifting, are going to be approaching pharmaceutical companies to talk specifically about what we want the most favored nation price to be based on the best data we have.
03:02We're looking forward to a thoughtful interaction with these corporate leaders, many of whom we've spoken to and in quiet will agree the system is not right the way it is.
03:13They're patriotic Americans. They want what's right.
03:15But the fact that in my lifetime, as Secretary Kennedy said, for the first time we have a thoughtful and aggressive approach, thanks to President Trump,
03:23on taking on these special interests, I should give all Americans confidence that this is an administration that stands for fairness
03:31and should chill the waters for those who believe they can push us away from our North Star, which is to take care of the American people.
03:38Mr. President, God bless you.
03:41Jay, you want to go next?
03:44Mr. President, God bless you.
03:45Thank you, sir.