Dan Burton: “the big issue that is being raised on the front page of USA Today, which I hope all of my colleagues will have a chance…”

“the big issue that is being raised on the front page of USA Today, which I hope all of my colleagues will have a chance to read, is the very large price disparities between prescription drug costs here in the United States and what they cost elsewhere in the world. I was amazed that the media is really finally jumping on this issue, because the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Gutknecht), who has been leading the fight on this issue, has been working on it a long time. It shows very clearly that the people in the USA pay 58 percent more for prescription drugs than people in Switzerland do, 60 percent more than they spend in Great Britain, 67 percent more than Canada, 74 percent more than Germany, 78 percent more than Sweden, 102 percent more than France and 112 percent more than Italy. This is a fact. The American people are paying so much more for pharmaceutical products than other countries and people who are buying prescription drugs in other parts of the world that Americans are going across the border into Canada in droves to buy their pharmaceutical products because it saves them so much money. When you have a little old lady who cannot afford her pharmaceutical products and her health is at risk, you cannot blame her for going across the Canadian border to buy the very same prescription drug for one-fourth or one-fifth or one-sixth of what it costs here in the United States.”