In the VP debate on October 1, JD Vance and Tim Walz debated many topics, including insurance and reproductive rights.
Both candidates talked about drug prices and the need to lower them, but neither gave many details about how their running mates would do so, experts told ABC News.
Walz brought up the Biden-Harris administration policy to begin direct price negotiations on 10 widely-used drugs under Medicare, as well as the Inflation Reduction Act that helped cap out-of-pocket costs for insulin under Medicare at $35 a month.
Meanwhile, Vance discussed Trump’s 2019 executive order requiring all hospitals to make public any standard charges, payer-specific negotiated charges, the amount a hospital is willing to accept in cash, and the minimum and maximum negotiated charges.
Dr. Joel Cantor, a professor of public policy at Rutgers University, in New Jersey, said while transparency is important, it’s unclear how that might reduce drug prices.
“Transparency is good … but if you have a health plan that covers one drug in a class of drugs that you need, transparency doesn’t help you at all,” he told ABC News. “You may be able to use three different drugs but if only one’s in your employer’s plan, that’s it.”
Cantor also said that there’s early evidence that the Medicare drug price negotiation will help bring down costs, but it remains to be seen whether that will extend to people who are not yet enrolled in Medicare.
