We Work For Health Statement on Potential Policies in Budget Reconciliation Bill

We Work For Health Executive Director Dan Leonard issued the following statement ahead of an anticipated vote

“As Congress once again prepares for a long evening of budget reconciliation debates, we urge lawmakers to reject proposals – such as most favored nation (MFN) – that would undermine America’s world leadership in healthcare innovation and industry. MFN and similar government price control mandates would not lower patients’ out-of-pocket expenses, nor would they address the true drivers of unaffordable care: the opaque practices of pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) and vertically integrated insurance corporations that capture savings long before they ever reach patients.

“What MFN will do is import failed foreign price controls that ration care, delay access, and devalue the lives of patients and seniors. In every country with government price-setting, which will be used as a benchmark for MFN, patients have access to fewer medicines and wait longer for them. That is not a model America should import.

“Since the start of 2025, the life sciences industry has committed nearly $600 billion in new U.S. investment – driving research, expanding manufacturing, and creating jobs nationwide. Implementing MFN would upend this momentum at precisely the wrong moment, handing adversaries like China the strategic advantage it has been aggressively pursuing in the life sciences.

“Real healthcare affordability requires real solutions: holding insurance companies and PBMs accountable for rising healthcare costs, increasing transparency throughout the supply chain, and pursuing market-based reforms that stop foreign freeloading without dismantling the innovation ecosystem American patients depend on.

“We urge lawmakers to reject this proposal and pursue a path that puts patients – not foreign governments – at the center of American healthcare policy.