For many patients taking an expensive prescription drug, there is no lower-cost generic alternative — not because one couldn't exist, but because pharmaceutical companies have buried their drugs under dozens of additional patents, blocking competition and keeping prices high.
When a single generic enters the market, prices can drop 39%. The bipartisan ETHIC Act would accelerate that by automatically invalidating related patents when a generic manufacturer successfully challenges a key one — bringing lower-cost drugs to patients sooner, without touching real innovation protections.
I’ve lived with Crohn’s disease since I was 11. My current medication, Rinvoq, has a list price of $6,431, and past treatments like Remicade, Humira, and Stelara range from $1,100 to $14,000 per month before insurance. I believe life-saving medicine is a human right.Kevin Baker, ID
Currently, drugmakers can place dozens and dozens of patents on the drugs they manufacture, creating new patents as fast as they can be challenged in court. This bill would limit the number of patents a company can assert on biologic drugs — some of the most expensive drugs on the market — to 20 patents after the first 4 years on the market. This change would enable greater competition for biologics.
I am a retired nurse living with psoriatic arthritis and psoriasis for over 40 years. In 2023, I paid over $9,000 alone for my Enbrel prescription.Judy Aiken, ME
Preserve Access to Affordable Generics and Biosimilars Act
Brand-name drug companies routinely pay potential competitors to delay selling a generic version of a drug, therefore keeping it off the market in order for the brand-name drug to maintain its monopoly for longer. It’s called a “pay-for-delay” agreement, and S. 1096 bans these types of agreements to lower prices and save taxpayers $1.6 billion.
The blockbuster drug Humira is an example of the harms of pay-for-delay agreements. Manufacturer AbbVie paid multiple competitors to delay Humira generics, preserving its monopoly for years and keeping lower-cost options off the market.
Product hopping occurs when a brand-name drug company pushes for prescribing practices and patient use that favor a “newer” version of an existing drug, at the exact time an older version is losing its monopoly and about to face competition. Usually, the “new” version involves only a small change that is not a true clinical improvement. S. 1041 would ban product hopping for good.
The ETHIC Act Explained: What It Means for Patients
1:49 · Watch on YouTube
