Julie Reed: House Hearing Omitted Biosimilar Issues Despite Growing Need for Solutions

The main takeaway from the House Energy and Commerce Committee hearing on HHS's 2023 budget was that biosimilars were not mentioned as much as should have been, said Julie M. Reed, the executive director of the Biosimilars Forum.

Transcript

For those who missed it, what were some of the highlights from the House Energy and Commerce Committee hearing regarding the HHS budget for fiscal year 2023?

I think the highlights of that hearing mostly were, from a Biosimilars Forum perspective, it's what we didn't hear. We didn't hear enough about how HHS is going to do more to gain cost savings using biosimilars. How they're going to do more policies that we've been advocating for for years, [addressing] market barriers and improving access to biosimilars.

So, I think that was the most surprising thing for the Biosimilar Forum and our members. We heard a little bit about biosimilars. We've been saying, "Look, there's a solution right here to reduce prescription drug cost overall." It's such a critical, critical year for biosimilars, especially with the 7 biosimilars for Humira [adalimumab] launching next year.

So, we're going to go back and ask HHS to continue to support biosimilars and continue to work with them, especially on those upcoming launches. So, that was our takeaway, and it's now a greater priority for the Forum to get back to HHS.