Trump is right to investigate Germany — and he shouldn’t stop there

The Trump administration just launched a “Section 301” investigation into Germany’s pharmaceutical pricing practices. The move begins a process to address foreign free-riding by one of the world’s largest economies — and helps advance the broader goal of ensuring wealthy countries pay their fair share for global innovation.Patients in the United States, Germany, and every other country ought to cheer this news. For decades, Germany and other developed nations have underpaid for lifesaving medicines — and obtained low prices by delaying and rationing drug access. These access restrictions have had real impacts on patients.The U.S. government, under both Republican and Democratic administrations, has repeatedly asked Germany and other wealthy countries to end these practices. But they’ve refused those polite requests. So now, the Trump administration is ramping up the pressure on Germany — and considering investigating other countries’ pricing practices too. If it works, it could increase access and spark a research and investment boom that enables scientists to develop dozens of new lifesaving medicines in the years ahead. It’s easy to see why the Trump administration — just like prior administrations — is annoyed with European pricing practices. Germany pays only about a quarter of the market-based prices that Americans pay for brand-name medicines.American patients bear the cost of this freeloading via their wallets. But patients in other developed countries pay with their lives. Due to rationing measures, patients in 19 other high-income countries have access to just 36% of all new medicines, including pioneering cancer therapies, that launched globally in recent years. American patients on Medicare have access to 88% of these medicines.Even when the health systems in those developed countries decide to cover a new medicine, bureaucrats typically only allow the sickest patients to take cutting-edge drugs. Public insurance reimburses only 22% of new drugs for all approved uses. As a result, patients in those countries typically wait three years longer than Americans to access new medicines. When my mother died of colon cancer, I saw firsthand what happens when patients run out of treatment options, and in the decades since, I have worked to ensure patients around the world have access to the medicines they need. I know that these delays have life-and-death consequences. One European analysis found that nearly 400,000 deaths across the continent each year could be prevented if patients received timely access to effective existing treatments. If other wealthy countries like Japan, France, Sweden, Spain, and Switzerland paid their fair share for new medicines, it’d boost biotech companies’ global sales — and thus spur more investment in research and development. If Germany alone lifted its price controls, the increase in research and development spending would likely lead to the creation of three new drugs each year, according to an analysis from the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation. If all developed nations joined Germany in paying market prices, scientists would likely develop 25 additional new medicines annually. Any one of those drugs could be a cure for cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, or some other deadly scourge.Section 301 investigations — or even the threat of investigations — have proven successful at prompting countries to change their behavior in the past. Earlier this year, the U.S. and the United Kingdom formalized a trade agreement in which Britain committed to doubling spending on innovative medicines as a share of GDP, in exchange for the Trump administration agreeing not to launch a Section 301 investigation or impose new tariffs.A LESBIAN GOLDMAN SACHS BANKER WITH AN IMMIGRANT PARTNER — AND THEY CALL HER GERMANY’S ‘NEO-NAZI’ LEADERThat agreement means British patients will enjoy improved access to new drugs — and that American patients will no longer shoulder such a disproportionate share of the global R&D burden.Politely asking other wealthy countries to reform their pricing practices voluntarily hasn’t worked. Patients can only hope that these Section 301 investigations, and the ensuing pressure tactics, prove more successful. More U.K.-style deals would enable scientists to develop more cutting-edge therapies — and ensure patients can actually access those lifesaving drugs. Andrew Spiegel, Esq., is the executive director of the Global Colon Cancer Association.