Ohio litigation pivotal to future of American health care prices

By Alan Wooten
The Center Square

Opponents of price controls brought on by the Biden administration and the $891 billion Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 have hope an Ohio chamber of commerce is successful in litigation they believe will ultimately land before the U.S. Supreme Court.

Dayton Area Chamber of Comm v. Robert F. Kennedy Jr., as the case is known, was before the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati on Wednesday morning for oral arguments. The chamber’s legal standing is pivotal, the chamber saying price controls are harmful and the government saying the chamber itself is unable to produce a “concrete interest.”

The three-judge panel did not immediately issue a ruling.

Jeff Stier, an attorney and senior fellow for Consumer Choice, said in a statement provided to The Center Square, "The federal government is trying to torture the standard set by the Supreme Court as to whether the chamber satisfies the second prong of the standing test for an association, which requires the case be germane to its broader mission. If opposing unconstitutional price controls, which are already directly harming a wide range of the chamber’s members isn’t germane to its mission, nothing ever will be."

O.H. Skinner, executive director for the Alliance for Consumers, said more options and more choices is best for consumers.

“The Biden administration went against this foundational rule of life when they tried to wipe countless household products off store shelves,” he said. “Thankfully, President Trump is reversing that. But there is another aspect of Biden's campaign against consumers that is still alive: price controls in health care. One of the fastest ways to harm consumers in the health care industry is to establish price controls that will stifle innovation and create shortages of products and services.”

Skinner said the rations on treatments in Europe and Canada testify to the harmful impacts. Even on procedures otherwise routine in the U.S. such as magnetic resonance imaging, commonly called an MRI.

"American consumers will only lose out from government mandated price controls, whether it’s not having access to prescriptions or waiting months for everyday medical procedures, it is important that access to health care remains as open as possible," Skinner said.

When the Inflation Reduction Act was passed, no Republicans were in favor. The administration was accused of designing a system that benefitted green energy products; held drug manufacturers hostage to accepting set prices, paying fines or exiting Medicare and Medicaid; and squashing litigations through the Department of Justice.

The Biden administration and its supporters have defeneded against those claims.

Joe Grogan, former Domestic Policy Council director for President Donald Trump, said the legislation increased taxpayer burden and limited access to drugs and coverage. May Mailman, former legal director at the Independent Women’s Law Center, said companies couldn’t afford to leave Medicare and Medicaid – programs accounting “for more than 40% of drug dollars spent in America,” she said.

Research for new therapies has been harmed by the legislation as well, says Daniel Troy of the Berkeley Research Group.

“The IRA is putting cost-cutting pressure on pharmaceutical companies, which are foregoing the cost, time, and risk it takes to develop new therapies,” he said. “As a result, many new and better drugs that might have been developed will not be available to meet consumers’ health challenges ... up to 135 cures for diseases may never be developed as a result of IRA’s provisions, a consequence that can only be measured in prolonged human suffering and premature death.”

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