Hawley: Need Legislation to Address Chinese Monopoly of U.S. Drugs

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) wrote a letter to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Monday, contending that it is “inexcusable” that America relies on China for its medical supply chain. Hawley called hearings and legislation to determine how to address America’s reliance on Chinese for producing vital medicine.

The Missouri conservative wrote a letter to U.S. FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn after reports revealed that the coronavirus has jeopardized the “domestic supply of some 150 prescription drugs, including antibiotics, generics, and branded drugs.”

Hawley said that the time is coming for Congress to have oversight and consider legislation to address the insecurity of America’s medical supply chain.

Hawley wrote to Hahn:

The degree to which some of our own manufacturers rely on China to produce life-saving and life-sustaining medications is inexcusable. It is becoming clear to me that both oversight hearings and additional legislation are necessary to determine the extent of our reliance on Chinese production and protect our medical product supply chain.

Reports have revealed the extent to which China produces and exports the overwhelming majority of pharmaceuticals to the United States. China exports 97 percent of all antibiotics and 80 percent of active ingredients used to make drugs in Americans.

Another report stated that America is losing its ability to make pharmaceuticals because of Chinese dumping of low-price products into the global market.

Rosemary Gibson, the author of China Rx: Exposing the Risks of America’s Dependence on China for Medicine, told Breitbart News Tonight host Rebecca Mansour that America should pursue a federal industrial policy to renew domestic manufacturing of medicines and medical products.

Gibson said:

I would have our federal government invest in helping to rebuild our industrial base using advanced manufacturing technology that can produce our medicines much more cheaply, safely, with less environmental footprint, and fully, from soup to nuts from those core raw materials to finished drug in one location all here in the United States.

There will be opponents who say, ‘No, we should let the market do it.’ The market will never do this. They’ll never make this investment. So we have to decide as a country, do we want to have some degree of self-sufficiency in our ability to make medicine? Do we want our military not to be dependent on China for pharmaceuticals to treat chemical and biological agents?

Gibson added, “We’ll be depending on China to help us out when we run out of medicines. The absurdity of it is extraordinary. We have to decide as a country, do we want to have some capacity to make our own medicines, or not?”