While my focus has been principally on drug pricing today, this hearing also, of course, deals with the question of medical devices.

I am particularly concerned that under what we have termed the 'Republican Default on America' legislation that was approved a week ago that in a 22 percent cut in NIH funding is going to deny us the very kind of cures that all of us today…

I think that much of the research shows that a good way to get new cures is to invest in the NIH.

I think that patients deserve a system that generates innovative research.

I think paying outrageous drug prices hasn't resulted in innovation. In fact, I think it has had just the opposite effect.

the NIH's budget should be doubled. But shockingly, a bill passed by the House instead cut NIH's funding by $10 billion.

Finally, Mr. Chairman, we have a responsibility to ensure that patients come first and that it is their health and their livelihoods, not drug prices, which must be non-negotiable.

I hope that moving forward we will not once again yield to the power of Big Pharma, instead, move to advance reasonable solutions that promote competition and achieve lower prices.

The real angel investors in research and development for new cures in America are none other than American taxpayers.

over 200 device qualified in the first 3 years of the program. And some of those didn't actually show any useful benefits for patients and had important safety risks.

Mr. Speaker, ``Here Comes the Sun.'' It is more than a great tune. It is about a great renewable future, but our Republican colleagues refuse to see through the dark smoke of fossil fuels and fossilized thinking. They just blindly follow…