The U.S. will try and get other governments to pay more for prescription drugs through trade negotiations and agreements, said Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar.
Part of the blueprint President Donald Trump will unveil Friday aimed at lowering U.S. drug prices will target “foreign freeloading,” according to summary the White House shared with reporters on Thursday. Some patients in other countries pay less because their governments set price controls.
Trump thinks he can lower drug prices in the U.S. by forcing foreign countries to pay more. The White House released a white paper in February calling for a way to get foreign countries to pay more for drugs.
Some have questioned how exactly the U.S. can make other governments pay more for drugs. Azar told CNBC’s “Squawk Box” it will do so through trade negotiations and agreements.
“So there are two ways we deal with that. The first is all of the initiatives that we’re going to have on our side of the fence … On the foreign side, we need to through our trade negotiations and agreements, pressure them…,” Azar said. “And so we pay less, they pay more. It shouldn’t be a one-way ratchet. We all have some skin in this game.”
