President Trump officially launches prescription drug website “TrumpRx”
President Donald Trump has officially launched TrumpRx, a new government website aimed at helping Americans buy medicines more cheaply.
The most common prescription drugs, picked up over the counter at a pharmacy or purchased by mail order, are likely to become more expensive under President Donald Trump’s plan to impose a 100% tariff on imported generic drugs within two years.
President Trump said in a social media post that all imported generic drugs will be duty-free for two more years, then 100% tariffs will be imposed on August 1, 2028, and 200% tariffs will be imposed one year later.
“This is being done to bring generic drug production back to America, and there will be penalties for companies that choose not to build factories and equipment within a set period of time,” President Trump said in a post on his Truth Social platform on July 21.
Tariffs will increase generic drug prices
Experts have warned that if tariffs are implemented, consumers will likely pay more for generic drugs, which account for 90% of prescription drugs sold in the United States. Health insurance companies and employers that sponsor medical benefits are also likely to absorb increased costs, which are typically passed on to consumers through higher premiums, copayments, and deductibles.
Consumers often turn to generic drugs to obtain cheaper drugs that are comparable to more expensive brand-name drugs. Drug pricing experts have warned that assessing tariffs on generic drugs will result in higher prices for the most commonly used medicines.
“Imposing major tariffs on generic drugs risks making the low-cost generic drugs that millions of Americans rely on more expensive and harder to obtain,” said Merris Basie, CEO of Patients for Affordable Drugs. “Tariffs of this magnitude could have significant impacts, including increasing costs, exacerbating shortages, and jeopardizing access to life-saving medicines.”
President Trump previously touted bargaining agreements with 17 drug companies that have agreed to most-favored-nation pricing agreements, which account for 80% of brand-name drugs sold in the United States. But those deals did not include generic drugs.
Industry groups have also warned that generic drug makers will find it difficult to cover the cost of tariffs. When the Trump administration announced that it would impose tariffs on imports from Canada, Mexico and China in 2025, John Murphy III, CEO of the Accessible Medicines Association, said generic manufacturers “just won’t be able to absorb the new costs.”
After President Trump’s announcement on July 21 regarding generic drug tariffs for 2028 and 2029, Murphy said his organization needed to better understand the terms. He said his group will pursue policies that “support and stabilize both the industry and the access needed to ensure patients have access to affordable medicines.”
Murphy added that generic drug manufacturing “has grown significantly in the United States over the past two years,” but warned that generic drug reimbursement is “significantly inhibiting the growth of this sector in the United States.”
Shifting to domestic manufacturing is costly
Vontobel analyst Stefan Schneider said the U.S. is trying to reverse the shift of generic drug production to lower-cost countries, but bringing back manufacturing would likely increase U.S. generic drug prices, Reuters reported.
Schneider added that any new rules would primarily affect China and India, where most generic drugs and drug ingredients are manufactured.
The United States has more than 1,400 manufacturing sites designed to convert pharmaceutical products into tablets, capsules or vials, provide quality control, and complete packaging and labeling. However, only 230 U.S. factories produce active pharmaceutical ingredients, according to data from QYOBO, a pharmaceutical intelligence platform.
By comparison, QYOBO says there are 524 pharmaceutical raw material factories in China, 564 in India and 670 in Europe. Pharmaceutical facilities in the United States are smaller and often produce fewer products than large factories in India or China.
Additionally, the raw materials for nearly half of the medicines designated as essential medicines by the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response are manufactured domestically. However, according to QYOBO, its U.S. locations do not produce the ingredients for 40 of 83 essential medicines.
