Tom Price: “And when you mention the decrease in quality of care and the decrease in access to care, people say, well, that is just…”

“And when you mention the decrease in quality of care and the decrease in access to care, people say, well, that is just smoke and mirrors. That is just conjecture. But if you look at programs that have had the effect of price fixing, and we can look at programs in our own Nation. You can look at them around the world and give grand examples for how you decrease access and decrease quality of care to individuals in health care, again, those very personal decisions. But if you want to look at something in this Nation where the government has stepped in and said, okay, we are going to fix prices, all you have to do is look a few short years back to the Vaccine for Children's program, something incredibly important to the American people, something incredibly important to the health of our Nation. In the early 1990s, there were about 30 or so pharmaceutical companies that were making vaccines, and they were aggressive and active in their research and development. The vaccines had a varying price depending on the disease that they were attempting to cover or to prevent, and the government came in and said, oh, those prices are too high. Those prices are too high. In fact, in order to provide vaccines for every single child and individual in this Nation we are only going to allow you to charge this much. That was in 1993 or 1994. Well, 12, 13 years later, remember, Mr. Speaker, there were about 30 or so pharmaceutical companies making vaccines. Do you know how many there are now?…”