Presidential candidate and former neurosurgeon Ben Carson suggested during the third Republican presidential debate on Wednesday that drug companies hiking the prices of life-saving drugs by 5,000 percent is the fault of a “regulatory structure” and simply said that some people go “overboard.”
CNBC host Jim Cramer referenced a pharmaceutical company that came under fire for hiking the price of a drug often used for AIDS patients from $13.50 per pill to $750 per pill overnight, asking the only doctor on stage about it.
“In recent weeks, another pharmaceutical company has been accused of profiteering, for dramatically raising the profits of life-saving drugs. You have spent a lifetime in medicine. Have these companies gone too far? Should the government be involved in controlling some of these price increases?” Cramer asked.
Carson responded by refusing to take sides. “Well, there is no question that some people go overboard when it comes to trying to make profits and they don’t take into consideration the American people. What we have to start thinking about as leaders, particularly in government, is what can we do for the average American?
“And you think about the reasons that we’re having such difficulty right now with our job market. Well, the average small manufacturer, whatever they’re manufacturing, drugs or anything, if they have less than 50 employees the average cost in terms of regulations is $34,000 per employee. Makes it a whole lot easier for them to want to go somewhere else,” he continued.
“So what we’re going to have to start doing instead of you know picking on this group or this group is we’re going to have to have a major reduction in the regulatory influence that is going on,” he said. “The government is not supposed to be in every part of our lives and that is what is causing the problem.”
Watch it:
So far the only presidential candidates who have shown a willingness to take on this issue are Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who are running for the Democratic nomination. They each introduced a plan that would limit the ability of companies to gouge prices.