Possible New Bill Championed by Raskin Could Change Medicine Forever
Today Rep. Jamie Raskin (MD-8), alongside several other Congress members, continued his fight to pass a possible new bill intending to change medicine for the better by supplying affordable healthcare to countless more Americans.
In the House Committee on Investigation, American attorney, law professor, and politician Raskin discussed the possibility of passing this bill, which includes fully legalizing importing generic drugs from Canada across the United States, transparency laws to share methods, and removing patents for medical products.
In an exclusive interview, Raskin said he gives outright support to just about everything this bill includes, except the patent control. When pressed why, Raskin responded, “I don’t support patent control because I think that it will reduce innovation because anyone can just recreate your medicine immediately after you release it. You’ll almost always make zero profit, thus disincentivizing innovation, and designing new drugs.”
While some Congress members completely opposed the bill, feeling like it gives the government too much influence on the free market, Jamie Raksin believes “if anything, it’s probably making the free market even freer because now you don't have these oppressive patents and restrictions that could completely destroy the free market and allow them to increase prices through absolutely absurd levels.”
In explaining the transparency aspect provided by the patent control, Raskin gave the example: “let’s say companies spend $10 dollars to make a bottle of pills, which does proceed to sell for $15,000 dollars, we can understand something might be wrong there and thus they’ll be pressured to reduce their prices, making the medicine more affordable for everyone.”
From avoiding massive price hikes to more efficient methods of genetic engineering, Raskin and some of his fellow Congress members are adamant this bill has the potential to change the nation’s flawed health care system for the greater good. For now, America will just have to wait to see the outcome.
This article was written by Raeann Cheong and Ariel Liao.
