The Build Back Better (BBB) bill, a whopping $1.9 trillion spending plan, is making its way. It could make a key part of President Joe Biden’s economic agenda a reality, according to CNN.
Biden and the Democratic majority in Congress believe they might have received a mandate in the 2020 election.
Most of the funding is focused on transforming the country’s social safety net by reducing the health care cost and combating climate change.
However, the BBB bill is going to adopt some policies that could harm the generic drug industry, according to Inside Sources. It could also harm pharmaceutical research and development, moving the country toward government-run healthcare.
Last month, the House passed the bill but is facing a tough road in the Senate, expecting to undergo a few changes.
The BBB bill allows the Health and Human Services (HHS) secretary to negotiate prescription drug prices, ignoring its use of foreign price controls, excise taxes, and inflationary rebates to determine drug costs, per the news outlet.
Advocates of price controls say the bill ignores the harm price controls will have on America’s global leadership in biopharmaceutical research and development. Also, it is overlooking the severe damage it will cause to the generic and biosimilar industry.
In the United States, the dynamic generic drug industry represents nearly 90% of all prescriptions. In 2020 alone, generics and biosimilars saved the health care system around $338 billion. Generics, in particular, saved consumers $2.4 trillion. While doing so, the generic drug market has encouraged competition and innovation.
One of the bill’s many drug price provisions includes setting a $35 monthly cap on insulin for Medicare beneficiaries and those with private insurance. The provision is likely to take effect in 2023.
A Kaiser Family Foundation analysis of the BBB bill found that Medicare Part D plans would not be able to charge more than $35 a month for the insulin products they cover in 2023 and 2024, and for all insulin starting in 2025. Kaiser said millions of Americans could save money under this provision.
However, advocates are concerned that the uninsured would not benefit from the cap and remain at risk, according to CNN.
Meanwhile, Wall Street economists believe that the BBB plan will become law. They also believe that the plan will be another big deal for the infrastructure industry. Economists at Goldman Sachs, Evercore ISI, Morgan Stanley, and J.P. Morgan have all written that they believe it’s a matter of time until the Senate passes Biden’s BBB Act, according to CNBC. They said that could mean a business boom for some of the country’s biggest construction and materials companies.
