WASHINGTON, D.C. — Patients For Affordable Drugs Now announced it is launching a new phase of its campaign today to combat recent Big Pharma lies and scare tactics. This seven-figure push includes a new TV ad that calls out the industry’s falsehoods and calls on Congress to listen to patients and pass Medicare negotiation. This leg of P4ADNow’s ongoing campaign also includes digital ads that will run across a variety of websites and news outlets and congressional outreach, where patient advocates will contact their members of Congress to demand passage of legislation to allow Medicare to negotiate.
“Drug companies will stop at nothing to maintain their monopoly power to dictate prices of brand-name drugs,” said David Mitchell, a patient with incurable blood cancer whose drugs carry a list price of more than $900,000 per year and founder of Patients For Affordable Drugs Now. “As momentum grows to pass legislation to allow Medicare to negotiate lower drug prices, the industry is pouring tens of millions of dollars into scaring patients with false and misleading ads, as it has done so many times in the past. This time, we aren’t letting Big Pharma get away with it. Medicare negotiation will improve access to medicines and save lives by lowering prices.”
P4ADNow’s new TV ad, which will run in Washington, D.C., during the month of September, speaks to Congress, saying: “Don’t listen to the lies. Don’t listen to the threats. Don’t listen to the lobbyists. Listen to patients.”
Watch the full ad here.
Big Pharma and its paid front groups launched two new ads just this week, demonstrating again their willingness to push whatever lies they believe will work to stop reform. The first ad is a scam that says that legislation to allow Medicare to negotiate will “cut your benefits and no longer pay for life-saving medicines.” Both claims are lies. Medicare negotiation legislation under consideration will actually improve Medicare benefits and access to drugs. The second ad claims that Medicare negotiation will “put up barriers” for patients. This is also false. The biggest barrier to access is price, and Medicare negotiation will improve access by lowering prices. These proposals will also encourage innovation by ensuring we pay the best prices for the best drugs and by allocating additional dollars to federal research to help spur innovation and new drug development.
“As a patient with an incurable disease who depends on innovative drug development to stay alive, Big Pharma’s deceiving message is truly offensive,” Mitchell continued. “Contrary to this propaganda, Medicare negotiation will actually help millions of Americans get the innovation we need at prices we can afford. And 90 percent of Americans support it. ”
The ad complements Patients For Affordable Drugs Now’s new fact check and video that break down false claims in pharma-funded ads, including misleading claims about the implications of repealing the non-interference clause and direct Medicare negotiation.
This phase of work launches as the Senate Finance Committee is drafting legislation that would allow Medicare to negotiate, which would deliver on the president’s Build Back Better plan. The House of Representatives will begin marking up the reconciliation package, including a version of its Medicare negotiation legislation, H.R. 3, next week.
Patients For Affordable Drugs Now is the only independent national patient organization focused exclusively on policy changes to lower prescription drug prices. It does not accept funding from any organizations that profit from the development or distribution of prescription drugs.
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