Posted by Michael Wonder on 19 Feb 2020
How the drug lobby lost its mojo in Washington
19 February 2020 - A rift between the GOP and its longtime pharmaceutical-industry allies is shaking up policy, as Republicans and Democrats join to overhaul price regulations.
The drug industry doesn’t pack the lobbying punch it once did, and one sign is something rare in the capital today—a dose of bipartisanship.
Sen. Chuck Grassley (R., Iowa) joined Sen. Ron Wyden (D., Ore.) to write a bill last July to regulate prescription-drug prices, an idea the industry has bottled up since the 1960s. Sen. John Cornyn (R., Texas) with Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D., Conn.) sponsored a bill in May to block drug companies from using patent laws to delay lower-priced drugs.
