Political Quotes

“I was not in any way suggesting you, individually, with respect to pharmaceutical companies. I was suggesting the amendment is very damaging to that research. The Senator mentioned we subsidized through NIH research, as we do a variety of other fields, not just pharmaceuticals, as well as providing research and development tax credit, which, of course, we do not just for pharmaceuticals but for a variety of different industries. What we also do is have the FDA process which is the most expensive and cumbersome existing in the world. It takes months, and in most cases years, longer to get a drug to market, and that cap starts from the time you file, not from the time of FDA approval. The fact we had a year or 2 or 3 or more, when drugs are available in other countries and not available here, it makes the time to recoup the investment shorter. That is one of the reasons our prices are high, because of the shorter time drug companies have as an opportunity to recoup their investment. They have a longer period of time in places such as Canada, which does not require the testing we do and the trials we do. The other reason is we also have a very expensive litigation system in this country. Pharmaceutical companies, not surprisingly, because they deal in the area of health care, are in court a lot for adverse reactions to their pharmaceutical products. Other countries do not have nearly the lucrative civil justice system, medical liability system, that we have in this country.”