Press Releases | August 6, 2025
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit stood with the lower court’s 2024 decision to dismiss the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Case
WASHINGTON, D.C. — In another blow to pharma’s multi-million dollar legal campaign against the Medicare Negotiation Program, today the Sixth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals blocked a legal challenge to Medicare’s authority to negotiate lower drug prices.
Brought by various Chambers of Commerce, including the Michigan, Ohio, Dayton Area, and U.S. Chambers of Commerce, a three-judge panel upheld the lower court’s ruling, finding that the Dayton Area and Ohio Chambers of Commerce are too far removed from the central issue – the constitutionality of a law aimed at drug manufacturers — to bring a valid legal challenge. The case was originally dismissed in August 2024 by a federal district judge in Ohio who slammed the Chambers’ “venue shopping” and attempts “to manipulate the system.”
In response to the decision, P4AD Executive Director Merith Basey released the following statement:
“This decision marks the 10th court ruling in favor of patients and against the pharmaceutical industry’s desperate legal attacks on the overwhelmingly popular Medicare Negotiation Program, which in January will deliver lower prices to more than 9 million patients across the nation. Pharma is spending millions in an attempt to protect its full monopoly pricing power at the expense of patients, but the courts keep rejecting the industry’s arguments. By upholding the lower court’s decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals is siding with American patients who deserve a much better deal against an industry that continues to try to hold them hostage.”
This ruling is the latest defeat for Big Pharma and its allies, who are working to overturn a law supported by over 80% of Americans and set to deliver lower drug prices for millions of people on Medicare starting this January – a historic milestone in the fight to lower drug costs.
Patients For Affordable Drugs has submitted four amicus briefs on behalf of patients and signed onto seven briefs, including in the Chambers’ case, led by Public Citizen and supported by Protect Our Care, Doctors for America, and Families USA to support the government’s opposition to the lawsuits and amplify the experiences of patients harmed by high drug prices.
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Patients For Affordable Drugs is the only national patient advocacy organization focused exclusively on policies that lower prescription drug prices. We empower and mobilize patients by amplifying their experiences with high drug prices to hold those in power to account and fight to shape and achieve system-changing policies that make prescription drugs affordable for all people in the United States. P4AD does not accept funding from organizations that profit from the development and distribution of drugs. To learn more, visit PatientsForAffordableDrugs.org.