{"id":1945872,"date":"2023-06-06T19:06:02","date_gmt":"2023-06-06T23:06:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/pharmaceutical-giant-sues-biden-admin-over-new-mandate-that-borders-on-extortion\/"},"modified":"2023-06-06T19:07:33","modified_gmt":"2023-06-06T23:07:33","slug":"pharmaceutical-giant-sues-biden-admin-over-new-mandate-that-borders-on-extortion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/pharmaceutical-giant-sues-biden-admin-over-new-mandate-that-borders-on-extortion\/","title":{"rendered":"Drug company sues Biden administration over mandate seen as extortion."},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">20<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fpharmaceutical-giant-sues-biden-admin-over-new-mandate-that-borders-on-extortion%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1945872&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><h2>Pharmaceutical Giant Sues Biden Administration Over New Mandate That &#8216;Borders on Extortion&#8217;<\/h2>\n<blockquote>\n<p>\u201cThis slow rolling government takeover of the pharmaceutical industry will strangle innovation, denying essential medicines to patients desperate for newer, more effective treatments.\u201d<\/p>\n<footer>&#8211; Joe Grogan, nonresident senior fellow at the USC Schaeffer Center<\/footer>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>Merck &#038; Co., a pharmaceutical company, has filed a lawsuit against the Biden administration over its \u201cDrug Price Negotiation Program,\u201d which the company argues violates the Constitution. The program, approved through the Inflation Reduction Act, allows the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to negotiate prices for high-cost prescription drugs and imposes an excise tax on companies that \u201crefuse to negotiate.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The lawsuit alleges that the program violates the Fifth Amendment by taking private property without providing \u201cjust compensation\u201d and the First Amendment by compelling companies to \u201clegitimize government extortion\u201d and participate in \u201cpolitical deception.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The program involves \u201cneither genuine \u2018negotiations\u2019 nor real \u2018agreements,\u2019\u201d the lawsuit says. \u201cRather, once HHS unilaterally selects a drug for inclusion in the program, its manufacturer is compelled to sign an \u2018agreement\u2019 promising to sell the drug to Medicare beneficiaries at whatever \u2018fair\u2019 price the agency dictates, which must represent at least a 25% to 60% discount.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Merck believes its anti-diabetes drug, Januvia, will be one of the first 10 \u201cnegotiation-eligible drugs\u201d chosen in September, per the lawsuit.<\/p>\n<h3>Consequences for Patients and Innovation<\/h3>\n<p>In an open letter published Tuesday, Merck said the program will have \u201cdevastating consequences for millions of patients in need\u201d by limiting innovation. \u201cUnder the IRA, the government will take Merck\u2019s patented innovations by coercing the company to provide third parties with access at prices the government sets,\u201d the company wrote.<\/p>\n<p>Josh Blackman, professor of law at the South Texas College of Law Houston, said in a statement that the government cannot \u201cforce pharmaceutical companies to \u2018sell\u2019 their patented drugs.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Joe Grogan, nonresident senior fellow at the USC Schaeffer Center, called the program \u201ca price fixing regime a Soviet bureaucrat would be proud of.\u201d<\/p>\n<h3>Launch of the Program<\/h3>\n<p>HHS intends to launch the program on Sept. 1 with the publication of its first 10 \u201cnegotiation-eligible drugs.\u201d HHS did not immediately respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n<h3>Disclaimer<\/h3>\n<div class=\"disclaimer\">\n<p><em>All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter\u2019s byline and their DCNF affiliation. <\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact\u00a0<a href=\"mailto:licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org\">licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><strong>Source:<\/strong> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.westernjournal.com\/pharmaceutical-giant-sues-biden-admin-new-mandate-borders-extortion\/\">The Western Journal<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Merck &amp; Co. sued the Biden administration, claiming that the &#8220;Drug Price Negotiation Program&#8221; violates the Constitution by forcing companies to enter into agreements with the Department of Health and Human Services or face financial penalties. The program, approved through the Inflation Reduction Act, allows HHS to negotiate prices.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":647,"featured_media":1945873,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[548],"tags":[21464,4106,3620,5425,5642,5527,5178],"class_list":["post-1945872","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-conservative-news-daily","tag-extortion","tag-administration","tag-biden","tag-company","tag-drug","tag-mandate","tag-sues"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1945872","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/647"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1945872"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1945872\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1945873"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1945872"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1945872"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1945872"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}