Bad Pricing Policy for Medical Products Is Bad Health For Americans Pharmaceutical and Medical Diagnostics Pricing Policy Must Benefit the USA The International Pricing Index Is A Disaster! PRESCRIPTION DRUG EXPERT: Dr. Salvatore J. Giorgianni, Jr., Pharm.D. is Senior Science Adviser to the Men's Health Network and a Past-Chair/Chair-Emeritus of the American Public Health Association and former Alumni Association Board Member of Columbia University School of Public Health. PHARMA RISKS ARE RISING... (1) During COVID, Watch Out for Counterfeit Drugs (2) US Must Decrease Dependency On Geopolitical Rivals For Critical Medical Supplies (3) US needs access to COVID medications not made by our enemies (4) Need to maintain security in the supply chain for Critical Technologies WHAT IS THE INTERNATIONAL PRICING INDEX? Setting prices of critical technologies such as medications and diagnostic products to prices in other countries is flawed: (1) These are Completely different consumer price indexes (2) Medical product companies outside of US are frequently supported or owned by a foreign government (3) Quality and regulatory standards in many countries are not adequate or at US standards, Inferior products are not what American’s deserve (4) Price Indexing and Government pricing boards have been a disaster in many countries such as Germany hurting access, quality and reliability of supply chain (5) US has seen such impacts on some product areas such as antibiotics because of Third Party Payer policies