Republican senators join attack on Biden’s proposal to seize drug patents based on price

As Pres­i­dent Joe Biden con­tin­ues to tout his ad­min­is­tra­tion’s ef­forts to low­er drug prices, 16 Re­pub­li­can sen­a­tors on Mon­day raised con­cerns with NIH di­rec­tor Mon­i­ca Bertag­nol­li over plans to “march-in” and seize phar­ma com­pa­ny patents if the price of a drug is too high.

Led by Sen. Bill Cas­sidy (R-LA), the rank­ing mem­ber of the Sen­ate Com­mit­tee on Health, Ed­u­ca­tion, La­bor and Pen­sions, the let­ter ar­gued that no fed­er­al agency has ever used the Bayh-Dole Act to do what Biden wants, and that the NIH has re­ject­ed sim­i­lar re­quests un­der the law.

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