Stop Big Pharma from price gouging on the coronavirus
Petition to HHS Secretary Azar:
The coronavirus is a public health crisis, not an opportunity for Big Pharma to get rich at our expense. Use every tool at your disposal, including Section 1498 and the Defense Production Act, to make sure coronavirus medicines are affordable for everyone.
Big Pharma companies are already trying to profit from drugs to treat or prevent coronavirus infection -- and we need your help to stop them.
Last week Gilead Sciences was caught attempting to get exclusive rights to one drug that has shown promise in treating covid-19. Under intense public pressure they backed off, but they still have the ability to raise the price high and gouge everyone for desperately needed medicine.1
Sign the petition: Stop Big Pharma from getting rich from and gouging the public for coronavirus medicine!
The Intercept discovered that Gilead had applied for, and the FDA had given them, exclusive marketing rights for remdesivir, an anti-viral drug that early studies have shown may help fight covid-19.
That means Gilead could have had a monopoly on an essential drug in the fight against the coronavirus pandemic. Even now that they've backed off on the exclusive rights, they still can charge a huge sum for the drug.
But there's a solution, one that the federal government regularly used in the 1960s and 1970s. Under a federal law known as Section 1498, the government can override a patent at any time as long as the company receives "reasonable compensation."
This gives the government critical leverage to negotiate lower prices. And the government could even start producing lifesaving treatments itself under the Defense Production Act.
Will you help use that leverage to save lives and stop Big Pharma from gouging people?
Add your name now: Stop Big Pharma from getting rich from and gouging the public for coronavirus medicine!
Sources:
1. The Intercept, "Gildead Sciences Backs Off Monopoly Claim for Promising Coronavirus Drug," March 25, 2020.