and rising deficit. we are live in little rock arkansas for the next up on the cspan bus 50 capitals tour with arkansas governor on key policy issues facing his state. be sure to watch cspan "washington journal" live at 70 string tuesday morning. join the discussion. now a conversation on efforts to lower prescription drug prices from "washington journal". >> each weekend we take a look at the intersection of your money and federal policy. we are joined by david mitchell to talk about prescription drug crisis. you can go for a spread what is your group. >> guest: it's to help patients for affordable drugs. we are the only national patient organization focused exclusively on policies to lower drug prices and we don't

take money from any organizations that have profited from the development. >> host: you are a patient yourself. >> yes. about seven years ago i was diagnosed with an incurable blood cancer. it's incurable, that's the bad news. the good news is that it's treatable but with very expensive drugs. the drug i took was $450,000. this experience of having a cancer that is tough and having to deal with these expensive drugs brought meth face-to-face with the challengess people confront and nobody was really speaking up on behalf of patients on drug pricing so my wife who is a little crazy too, and also a cancer survivor, she and i decided we would try to start a group to do this. >> host: how many patients are part of your group and how long have you been around. >> we launched almost a year

ago on february 22 of last year. we have collected 12000 patient stories and e-mail addresses from almost 30,000 people around the country. >> it's an advocacy organization, what is the tax filing, what are you legally allowed to do. >> we are a 5o1c3, that's patients for affordable drugs. we also have a 5o1c for which is the record advocacy arm called patients for affordable drugs now. what we are doing really, is taking patient stories and amplifying those to policymakers, elected officials, and mobilizing patients in our community to speak up for policies that will lower drug prices. last week, one of our patients testifiedd, a few weeks ago we had patients in washington

around a bill called the creates act which is designed to stop a certain form of abuse by patent companies. i went to a meeting with paul ryan's office. [inaudible] we are mobilizing patients online and beginning to mobilize patients directly to be advocates for themselves. >> you mentioned the advocacy arm. how does your group rate money? >> we get money fromp foundations in order to help leverage that money, my wife and i decided we would start the group with our own money. frankly we made a commitment to put in $75000 a year for three years and i work for free, i i retired to do this. we went to investors and said

he will work for free, will you help us. yes we've raised money from friends and family and people online who come to our website and they've given us a few bucks. we don't ask for money from patients but iff they want to help, we can s use the help. >> the president and founder of the group we're talking about prescription drug choices in your money segment, here's a reminder of o what the president had to say in the state of union address. one of my greatest priorities is to reduce the price of prescription drugs. [applause] in many other countries these drugs cost far less than what

we paid in the united states and it's very, very unfair. that is why i have directed my administration to make fixing the injustice of high o drug prices one of my top priorities of the year. [applause] prices will come down substantially. >> that was a present from his state of the union address. he released his fiscal 2019th plan. what we know about how h he is going to putat that into action to bring prices down? >> guest: the reason is there

are government granted monopolies given to the pharmaceutical companies and they are allowed to charge whatever they want. we think the present was right year ago when he said drug companies are getting away with murder. unfortunately, in the proposals we've seen so far, a document that was released last week by the council of economic advisors in the white house completely excludes farm off from any action that will lower drug prices. instead the document says we will change insurance plans which could be good, wordiness change design and benefits under medicare and medicaid which also could be good but the headwaters, the root of the problem is the retail prices set by the drug company and there is nothing that we have seen that will address that. the documents are coming today

and we will see more detail. we are veryy interested to see whether they will actually do something that would go after the root cause of the problem. >> what would be the best way to go at the root cause of the problem. >> two ways, one is, as the president suggested last year the federal government should negotiate directly with the drug companies to lower drug prices. every other country in the world does that. we're the only one who doesn't so we pay more. the other would be to really tackle the problem of abuse. it's a government granted monopoly that allows them to make ago lot of money during the time of exclusivity. drug companies do things called pay for delay, they don't give samples of their product, jimmy generic manufacturers need those

samples to develop the generic equivalent and we need patent reform. in fact there's aa bill in congress that the president could come out and support called the creates act. it would save taxpayers $3.3 billion in speed generics to market and he could stand up for that right now. it's bipartisan in both houses and we could do it this week. >> owner talk more about thers creates act but on the first part of what you're talking about, bloomberg and its reporting about what's being willsed in what we likely see in the budget document proposals don't include something that president trump has threatened and is one of the drug industry's biggest fears, having them negotiate some places directly and that's what you think would help the most? >> that an patent reform would do the most to help drive down drug prices in this country. >> host: i want to invite viewers to join the

conversation. we split our phone lines up regionally. we want to hear your stories and your questions forti david mitchell. he is with patients for affordable drugs. >> guest: i do want to add one thing, there are problems all down the drug distribution chain and there is a fine report that was issued last november by the national academies of science, 17 people, chaired by a man called norm augustine who was the former ceo of lockheed martin and their two chief recommendations to lower drug prices were that medicare should be able to negotiate directly for drug prices and reform. those two things from the national academy of sciences

completely missing so far from any of the white house proposals. >> mary is an island heights new jersey. good morning. >> thehe morning. i want to bring attention to the unanimous approval of the 2012 fda safety and invasion act which gave fda the right to charge fees for generic drug manufacturers.s these fees are unfair because if you make a thousand generic drugs this year you pay $248,000. generic drugne your fee is $248,000. 65 generic drug manufacturers have gone out of business because of the structure. >> .familiar with the generic fee structure for fda user fees.. i canis say this, the way we expresss competition to drive

down prices underis the legal framework we

host: to tammy in vienna, virginia. good morning. caller: hi. understanding is that many and medical protocols actually have their root necessary federal funding, so ies might support heir research and development efforts when they're new. it stands to reason that these companies would be required agreeable to more negotiating prices down the they havecially since benefited from federally funded research. what is your comment on that? i couldn't agree more,

tammy, thank you. roughly 50 to 60% of all the major new breakthrough to market in e this country, come about as a taxpayer investment, investment by the national nstitutes of health, directly from the fifty or 60% it reprograms your t cells to go find the cancer and kill it. the nih invested more than $200 million.

the head of the and i nih says it's grounded in initial basic science that was conducted by the nih. they put a price of $475,000 just for the drug. then the cost of care associated with administrating that drug is another half million dollars and i'm not exaggerating. it's a million-dollar treatment. we can keep pricing drugs this way that we all pay to develop. we have to have a discussion about how we price drugs to maximize accessibility and affordability while maintaining the rich r&d pipeline. >> i want to circle back to the creates act. this from the reporting this morning noting that the pharmaceutical industry was able to create and check keep the creates act out of the budget agreement. as a reminder, it's to make it

easier for companies to make generic drugs to obtain samples of the brand-name products that they were trying to copy. senior republican aide was quoted saying the problem is that it would be giving away the store's trial lawyers. it would allow generics to sue for access the product samples.. andrea: that senior staffer is confused. trial lawyers can't sue under the creates act. only bona fide generic companies who have filed a request with the fda to manufacture the drug and whose safety protocols have been cleared can request the drug so they are the only ones who could sue. in other words, companies can get the drugs could sue and an affirmative defense is to simply provide the samples and then the whole thing goes away.

that is long and this is just further scare tactics on the part of the pharmaceutical industry which is not being truthful about this bill and the woman i described to you from congressman mori ends district who came from wisconsin to meet with his staff, she is on a drug and the reason that drug is so expensive is because of this abuse by the company that makes the drug. it has refused toie provide samples, the companies want to make a cheaper generic. they finally entered into agreement that doesn't allow a generic to come to market until 2022. that's five years more of exclusivity. it's called pay for delay. >> who should we be watching congress. >> that's a darn good question.

the lead sponsor is senator leahy but it has support, strong bipartisan support from senator grassley of iowa, ted cruz, rad paul, they all support it. senator kennedy of louisiana signed on last week. those are all republicans, and thenhe it has really strong support from the democratic side. i would say watch the house judiciary committee and watch the negotiations coming up on the funding bill that is due to bee coming up in march becausee intend to make another big push to tha to get that included inte funding bill. we were adding cosponsors last week. >> to think of it gets to the president's desk he will sign it. >> i can't speak forpr the president, but it is consistent with what he says he wants. i would say yes.

>> jacksonville florida, good morning. >> morning. my comment is on the price of prescription drugs. it has taken us almost to poverty level and the medication i take, the majority are the tierth three drugs that have no generics and just one medication without my insurance is almost more than half of what i receive in social security. my problem is that we are going to be in the doughnut hole in about four or five months and

were going to be having to choose between medicine and food andfo bills. we don't qualify for food stamps and we don't qualify for medicare extra help and we don't qualify for anything else. >> thank you for sharing your story.t: david mitchell. >> this is the kind of story which is the reason we are doing this. it makes me so mad. she is just expressing what millions of people are experiencing around the country, the out-of-pocket for the 12 most expensive drugs for people who have medicare part d coverage, like she has, run from $4400 per year tor about $12000 per year. that's the median. not the highest the median cost for those 12 drugs. this is for people who are making a median income of about $26000 per year. it's just wrong.

medicare should be negotiating over the price of these drugs. there are proposals to cap out-of-pocket under medicare part d. we have to see what those look like because there is a way you can cap prices and it's like a balloon. you squish it here and it comes out there. if it's going to raise prices for people, if it's going to raise premiums for people that it may not be the best solution. the root cause of the problem is that we are not negotiating over the price of d used drugs with e drug company. >> david mitchell is with patients for affordable drugs. you've heard some of the stories from viewers. patients for affordable drugs has a map of the various patients that you work with a cross-country in their stories.

i imagine you can click on these documents to hear the stories and see the stories, some of the patients that work with them. david mitchell is with us until about 940 this morning. taylor is in iowa. good morning. >> yes i just wanted tofo talk about the affordable drugs. i see a lot of people around here where they can't quite afford what they need. one thing i've noticed is that the cannabis industry will take down the pharmaceutical industry and i hope that happens because we don't all these people getting their pockets full. that is all, thank you. >> i'm not sure what that comment was i'm not familiar with the cannabis industry so i have to say, i wish you well. >> lynette is waiting in clearlake california.

>> i think the biggest problem we have with prescription drugs is that the senators in our congressman are selling their votes to big pharma and they have to vote for that. they don't represent us, they take the money and it's so irritating. i live on $12000 a year and i just got a bill from my silver script medicare drug plan and they want $57 from me. that is taking food out of my mouth. >> that comment, thank you for that, that is emblematic of what we hear forse so many. we have patient to tell us all the time i have to choose between buying food and paying rent and buying the drugs i need. patients tell us they cut their pills in half or skip doses.

people have type one diabetes who have to have insulin to manage their disease who try not to use it until their blood sugar spikes which is really dangerous for a diabetic. it can put themd into insulin shock because they can't afford the drugs they need. we have a patient who told us two weeks ago that he has cancer and he has multiple sclerosis. he can't afford both drugs so he let his multiple sclerosis progress because hee has to tret hurts cancer or he will die. this is happening all over america. she is absolutely right that the pharmaceutical industry is one of, if not the most powerful industry in the country. they spent billions of dollars over the past 40 years building up a regulatory framework. it enables them to charge monopoly prices and we all pay forr it. >> how you feel about alex is our.

>> i think he is very experienced, he worked at the department of health and human services and i think he understands the drug industry quite well during the time he spent as the head of operation of the lily but it remains to be seen if he will use his knowledge and experience to he isdrug prices and if willing to do with the national academy of science suggests which is a balanced approach from the production of the drugs to the pharmacy counter, we have a lot of reforms we have to make but you can't leave the drug companies out of it. it appears he is in fact leaving the drug companies outut of it. >> to jim, good morning smacked the morning. we back when i was in the

military like you like i said, the military was there to blow things up and kill people and my son who is a combat marines. [inaudible] after 911 we had to do something and we went in there with a much bigger footprint and showed the bad guys where the stuff was to be put together that we didn't want to be the target of any attack. >> bring us to drug prices. >> i'm sorry? say that again. >> bring us to prescription drug prices when social program spending as much bigger than the military spending, there's a problem with both parties but definitely the democratic socialist that aren in there.

it's leading morris toward socialism. >> okay, we got your topic and your point, we are going to stick to our topic of drug prices. the founder of patients for affordable drugs is with us for another ten minutes. we want to get to asny many cals as we can. tony from baltimore, good morning. >> morning. i am in my 70s and about 30 years ago, i was listening to a talk show and they are interviewing the ceo of a pharmaceutical company. he is explaining why pharmaceuticals have gotten so expensive. he is going through all these reasons and it is a call in show. a gentleman calls in and said i lived in a farm on my life and 30 years ago we raised a lot of sheep and there was a certain pill we gave the sheep, and i'm not sure what to h treat, but he said that pill cost six cents. recently, they say it could also help in the treatment of some type of cancer.

now that pill is six dollars. he said to a the ceo, why? you can't say research, they had to recoup their investment, the pill is 30 years old. the guy blurted out because it will save your life and he caught himself and realized what he did and that's basically why pharmaceuticals are so high. >> thank you tony. i have an incurable disease. it's incurable because my cancer mutates. if i want to live as long as i hope, like to see my youngest kid graduate from college and have a grandkids someday, i need them to develop new drugs. we need them to invest in drugs

and innovation but there is no direct correlation between the price of drugs and the investment in research for new drugs. if you ask me, if my kid is lying on the gurney and you asked me what are a you willingo pay to save your child's life, i say whatever it takes. i will sell my house and empty my bank account. that's the wrong question. we need to ask this question. why does the price for new drugs that maximize accessibility and affordability while maintaining a robust r&d pipeline for the new drugs we all want to need and a reasonable return for the drug companies that commercialize those drugs. right now the drug companies care about one thing and that's maximizing profits. accessibility and affordability is not what they're focused on. iswe need to re- way the discussion back to making sure people can get the medicine they need. >> what is a reasonable profit to use. >> that depends.

taxpayers paid to invent me to look at that drama actually modeled it with a word and a former ceo of poster paper and figure out that if drug company and is 27% and 19% are continuing currently because we got to have that, they could charge $100,000. instead they are charging $175,000 and they will make profit of 65% on a drug that we helped him vent. we think we were at what is your return in 2010 in the case,

there is is more than fair. >> .are you doing. thank you for taking my call. would you believe that i have blue cross blue shield on top of medicaid and i still have to pay 12 or $14 for my medicine at the drugstore. it's cheaper for me to go to the drugstore than it is to go to the va. that just doesn't't seem fair. my wife was a school teacher and she had a pay $350 a quarter just to be on my insurance. it is insane. we worked all our lives and if

it wasn't for my son, i'm catching hell. >> things for your call. i understand. i would urge you to come to patients for affordable drugs.org and leave your story, codee-mail address and zip and join our community. we are already realizing tens of thousands of patients across the country and you can be a part of that too help address the challenges you and your wife are having right now. i am sorry for those. >> this is linda in ohio, good morning. >> morning mr. mitchell, good luck to you with your illness. i wish you the best. easy question. last i was diagnosed with psoriasis which i didn't even know is an autoimmune issue so i'm on a drug which is a self injecting drug and i'm paying

virtually nothing for it because my husband's healthcare is paying for it and they also pick up the drug company picks up part of the premium that i would normally pay. the program is only good for two years. my question for you what's going to happen when the two years is up? right now i take two of those a month and each pen is $7500. period two is $15000 which is half of my annual income. what do they do? how does that work request. >> is a further reflection of the fact that the drug companies control the prices. they set the price really high and they give you a discount for your copayment part of it, but everybody else, all of us, you, me are still paying for the

premium through our employer or our taxes. by doing this they keep you in their control that's why we are taking steps to lower the retail's price so you do not have to rely on those programs from the drug companies which are way for them to disperse their product.

put on that deal and that in their pocket.

not only that, but the donation, "donation" they made to a foundation to give you that deductible, is tax so they get that back, too. these are marketing programs. is why the drug prices tarts with lowering retail price of the trug. now we have other issues on the pharmacy benefit managers who control 80% of the run t, they are people who the shshs drug programs, there are other issues, if we don't to drug pricing, we don't get at the problem. ost: another jeffrey in frederi frederick, maryland, good morning. caller: good morning. doing? start off by thanking david doing l and c-span for this program it is very needed. i had two questions, my two were, is there going to be a difference between life savingprograms like life drugs like harvoni, during this

the hiv we're having, epidemic, difference in maintenance drugs or can there a difference? with the uestion was piate epidemic, they are not talking with car fentanyl and rugs being brought into this country. i'm a chronic pain patient with ms, suffering more today getting able to n and being live my life because there is an pidemic of this proportion, which i understand and i family and my town, as well, but in the process, you know, all these people that have cancer and ms, and chronic pain, suicide ommitting because they can't get proper help. host: mr. >> i'm just going to talk about help c drive.

hepatitis c drugs, right now there are millions of people in this country who can't get access to those drugs because they're just too expensive. they cure hepatitis c, we could wipe it out but the drug companies who own the drugs, has priced it out of reach for many programs, especially public programs and we have folks who could be cured who aren't because the price is too high. >> what about the access to pain medication and the impact that the effort to cut down on opioid has had on patients who use it correctly and need it? >> guest: i am not an expert on opioid addiction. i believe we need better steps to track the distribution of this drugs, how they're getting into people's hands, prescribing

patterns by doctors, dispensing patterns by pharmacies to get a better handle, and then people who have addiction need appropriate treatment and that could be treatment at treatment centers, could be drugs to help wean people up a of addictive drugs. we need both of those things. we need to make sure we're cracking down on the supply and also supporting the people who are trying to fight their addiction. >> host: the group is patients for affordable drugs, it's patients for for affordability drugs.com.

>> up next, look at artificial intelligence and machine learning from the consumer electronics show. the senate is debating a number of immigration proposals this week, as mart of a deal by majority leader mitch mcconnell. we'll get an update in an hour. the white house released president trump's budget today. one of his priorities is infrastructure spending. later a conversation on election security.