The Trump administration’s Section 232 investigation into pharmaceutical imports is reportedly close to being final. The final investigation’s success will depend largely on whether or not the Commerce Department determines that there is a crisis in the generics industry — an issue that President Trump highlighted back in 2023.
As proof that no company can match China on price, Chinese producers of active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) and the key starting materials (KSMs) used to make them are slashing prices by up to 50%. Not even low-cost India – one of the largest importers of Chinese KSMs – can compete at those levels.
The findings refute claims by the pharmaceutical lobby that tariffs would harm consumers, and instead underscore the urgent need for strong trade measures to reshore U.S. production of essential medicines.
America is dangerously reliant on high-risk foreign suppliers for essential generic drugs, especially APIs concentrated in China and India. That over-reliance has already triggered preventable crises, such as nationwide chemotherapy shortages when a single overseas plant shut down.
Aurobindo Pharma’s proposed $5.5 billion acquisition of Prague-based Zentiva poses an unacceptable risk to Europe’s and America’s pharmaceutical security. CPA is calling on the European Union (EU), including Czech authorities and European Commission competition regulators, to reject the transaction.
The United States has become incredibly dependent on imports to meet its daily pharmaceutical needs. This heavy reliance on imports is now creating serious drug shortages and has led to a flurry of safety concerns.
America is facing a growing crisis in its medical system — not from a lack of talent or innovation, but from a breakdown in the control, safety and supply of essential medicine. Our growing reliance on imports is now driving serious drug shortages, destabilizing supply chains and increasingly making medications unsafe.
In the U.S. today, frontline cancer treatments are being rationed. ERs are short on sedatives. Amoxicillin—one of the most prescribed antibiotics in the country—has been in critical shortage. These are not temporary disruptions. They reflect a structural breakdown caused by the erosion of America’s pharmaceutical manufacturing base and a decades-long surge in generic drug imports.
U.S. based generic drug makers need government support to expand – and maybe even to survive – the onslaught of imports nearly every member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee Subcommittee on Health said in a hearing on Wednesday.
The American pharmaceutical supply chain has become dangerously dependent on imports and foreign-controlled supply chains. Over the past 20 years, the country has experienced a skyrocketing rate on pharmaceutical imports and increasing foreign reliance.
