Merck, J&J CEOs conform to testify in Senate hearing on drug prices

The CEOs of Merck and Johnson & Johnson have voluntarily agreed to testify at an upcoming Senate hearing on high drug prices within the U.S., Sen. Bernie Sanders announced Friday, as lawmakers ramp up efforts to rein in health-care costs for Americans. 

The Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee’s hearing is scheduled for Feb. 8 at 10 a.m. ET.  

The panel had planned to vote to subpoena J&J CEO Joaquin Duato and Merck CEO Robert Davis to testify after each executives declined earlier requests to seem on the hearing. Those subpoenas would have been the first issued by the committee since 1981. 

Meanwhile, Bristol Myers Squibb CEO Chris Boerner and one other unnamed pharmaceutical CEO agreed to initial invitations to testify. 

The panel will ask each executive to offer testimony about why their corporations charge substantially higher prices for medicine within the U.S. than in other countries. The push to chop drug prices is one in every of the rare issues that has united each major political parties lately — though they’ve often backed different approaches to doing so.

Sanders, who chairs the Senate Health panel, noted that every one three corporations manufacture among the most costly drugs sold within the U.S., including Merck’s diabetes drug Januvia, J&J’s blood cancer treatment Imbruvica and Bristol Myers Squibb’s blood thinner Eliquis. 

All three of those treatments will likely be subject to the primary round of Medicare drug price negotiations, a key policy under President Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act that goals to make costly medications more cost-effective for seniors. J&J, Merck and Bristol Myers Squib are all suing to halt the talks, which is able to establish recent prices that can go into effect in 2026. 

“I hope very much that the CEOs of those major pharmaceutical corporations will take a serious take a look at these incredible price discrepancies and work with us to substantially reduce the costs they charge the American people for these and other pharmaceuticals,” Sanders said in a press release Friday. 

In a press release, a Merck spokesperson said “we trust that this will likely be a productive hearing geared toward enhancing the committee’s understanding of the pharmaceutical industry and finding common sense solutions to the challenges facing patients.”

The corporate had offered its U.S. president as a witness, arguing that official was higher equipped to field questions on drug pricing, in accordance with the spokesperson. However the committee declined.

A spokesperson for J&J said the corporate looks forward to “constructing an understanding of our longstanding efforts to enhance affordability and access to medicines.”

Last yr, the Senate Health Committee similarly heard testimony from the CEOs of Moderna, Eli Lilly, Novo Nordisk and Sanofi on high drug prices.