Eli Lilly opposes Trump MFN drug pricing law, CEO Ricks says

Eli Lilly opposes the White House’s push to codify “most favored nation” drug pricing into law, CEO Dave Ricks said in an interview with CNBC.

Lilly is one of more than a dozen drugmakers that signed deals with the Trump administration last year agreeing to charge similar prices for prescription drugs in the U.S. as in other wealthy nations. President Donald Trump has long complained that Americans pay high prices to subsidize low prices for medicine in the rest of the world.

The pharmaceutical industry thought the agreements would pacify those concerns and thwart attempts to make “most favored nation” pricing the law. But the White House in recent months has pushed Congress to codify elements of the deals. The draft text hasn’t been shared publicly, though the administration has said it’s trying to get pharmaceutical companies to back the effort.

Lilly doesn’t support it, Ricks said.

“When you throw it into the congressional process, what goes in is not what’s going to come out,” Ricks said. “And I think we see a lot of people who would rather reduce prices today and not worry about whether we have any new medicines tomorrow, not worry about whether America will have a robust drug industry and we’ll be able to do research in this country. And I worry about those things, so I don’t think that’s a great idea, and we’ve been pretty clear with the administration and the congressional leaders about that.”

Ricks said he thinks the Trump administration and leadership on the Hill are listening to the company’s concerns, but he said Lilly will use “all the tools we have to combat bad policy, and we think it would be bad policy.”