Advocates to Protest Congressman Scott Peters for Vote Against Rx Price Negotiations

San Diego District Office Protest - Friday, September 17, 11:00 am

Peters voted yesterday against a House leadership version of a drug pricing bill that Politico reports “… would allow direct government negotiations over the prices of hundreds of drugs, penalize manufacturers that raise prices faster than inflation and apply both policies to private insurance plans as well as Medicare.”

Instead, Peters and 2 centrist Democrats introduced an alternative, far weaker drug pricing bill earlier this week

A group of HIV/AIDS and drug pricing advocates, including many from AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF), will stage a protest in front of the San Diego district office of San Diego Congressman Scott Peters (D-CA, 52^nd District) on FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 17 at 11:00 AM to protest his vote yesterday against drug pricing reform allowing Medicare to fully negotiate drug prices with drug companies. The House Energy and Commerce Committee voted yesterday on the prescription drug pricing resulting in a 29 to 29 tie. Peters voted against the bill.

On Tuesday, Politico reported: “Efforts to wrap the (House leadership’s) language into the House Democrats' party-line social spending bill ran into opposition Tuesday from a cadre of moderates led by Rep. Scott Peters (D-Calif.), who put forward a narrower set of pricing policies and threatened to withhold their support unless they're adopted. The centrist group, which also includes Reps. Kathleen Rice (D-N.Y.) and Kurt Schrader (D-Ore.), would only allow negotiation for a small subset of drugs in Medicare Part B that have no competition.”

MEDIA CONTACTS:

SAN DIEGO:

• Patty Bermudez, MBA, Senior Region Director, AHF +1.323.203.7381 cell patricia.bermudez@ahf.org
• Laila Goring, President, LOUD (Latino Outreach and Understanding Division), San Diego chapter +1.619.313.1973 cell lailagoring@gmail.com

LOS ANGELES:

• Ged Kenslea, Senior Director, Communications, AHF +1.323.791.5526 cell gedk@aidshealth.org

“While Democrats ran on lowering drug costs, Congressman Peters just voted for profits over people with his vote against allowing Medicare to negotiate drug prices,” said Michael Weinstein, president of AHF. “Peters has been one of Congress’ largest recipients of drug industry money. He also previously introduced federal legislation in 2017 that would have severely curtailed nonprofit hospitals’ participation in the 340B program, a federally administered drug discount program that costs the government and taxpayers nothing. We protested him then and were able to help stop that terrible legislation from advancing. Peters has again placed the drug industry and its outsized profits—as well as industry contributions to his political campaigns—ahead of the interests and wellbeing of his constituents.”

Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT), who supports the House leadership’s more expansive drug pricing overhaul, issued a statement yesterday:

“At a time when the drug companies are charging us by far the highest prices in the world, Congress must demand that Medicare negotiate prices with this extremely greedy and powerful industry. Year after year, the pharmaceutical industry makes extraordinary profits and provides their CEOs with obscenely high compensation packages. Meanwhile, one out of five Americans cannot afford the prescriptions their doctors write, and thousands die each year because they lack the money to buy the medicine they need.”

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT)

A separate Politico article yesterday also reported that now “A total of five House Democrats are behind Peters’ alternative proposal, with (Rep. Stephanie) Murphy (D-Fla.) and Rep. Lou Correa (D-Calif.) joining the three Energy and Commerce holdouts,” increasing the jeopardy of the House leadership’s version of the bill.

Advocates from AHF intend to target other members of Congress on this issue in the future.

About AHF

AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF), the largest global AIDS organization, currently provides medical care and/or services to over 1.6 million individuals in 45 countries worldwide in the US, Africa, Latin America/Caribbean, the Asia/Pacific Region and Eastern Europe. To learn more about AHF, please visit our website: www.aidshealth.org, find us on Facebook: www.facebook.com/aidshealth and follow us on Twitter: @aidshealthcare

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210916005957/en/

While Democrats ran on lowering drug costs, San Diego Congressman Scott Peters--one of Congress' largest recipients of drug industry money--just voted for profits over people with his vote AGAINST allowing Medicare to negotiate drug prices. Shame!