Six Reasons Drug Prices Are So High in the U.S.

Florida’s plan to save money by importing medications from Canada, authorized this month by the Food and Drug Administration, has renewed attention on the cost of prescription drugs in the United States.

Research has consistently found that drug prices in America are significantly higher than those in other wealthy countries. In 2018, they were nearly double those in France and Britain, even when accounting for the discounts that can substantially reduce how much American health plans and employers pay.

“The U.S. market is the bank for pharmaceutical companies,” said Ameet Sarpatwari, an expert in pharmaceutical policy at Harvard Medical School. “There’s a keen sense that the best place to try to extract profits is the U.S. because of its existing system and its dysfunction.”