Report: Bipartisan support for patent reform to lower drug prices

The Initiative for Medicines, Access and Knowledge (I-MAK) released new survey data on Americans' opinions about prescription drug pricing and affordability, showing more bipartisan support for patent reform than for government price controls.

Conducted by Franklin & Marshall College's Center for Opinion Research beginning in May 2025, the baseline survey polled 726 randomly selected U.S. adults online or by phone over the course of 24 days.

The research examined the public's attitudes toward prescription drug prices and the U.S. healthcare system, assessing views on satisfaction, affordability, reasons for high pricing and policy reform.

Of those surveyed, most (58%) think U.S. prescription drug prices are unreasonably high, with Democrats viewing them slightly more unreasonable than Republicans.

Among them, more than 60% cite corporate greed and profit-chasing as the main factors contributing to high drug prices, with 84% of all respondents believing pharmaceutical companies make too much profit.

The findings come amid a worsening nationwide affordability crisis, with Americans across all demographics turning to dangerous cost-cutting measures like purchasing over-the-counter alternatives, delaying or skipping prescriptions or taking less than prescribed.

"Among the 71% of adults who reported taking prescription medications in the past year, one in three (31%) did not fill at least one prescription due to cost," the report stated.

Nearly 60% of adults who used prescription medicine in the past year tried at least one cost-cutting approach, while most used two different strategies on average. These behaviors were reflected similarly across the political spectrum.

Instead, the report indicated that social determinants of health, such as gender, education level and other household demographics, strongly influenced whether individuals skipped prescriptions because of the cost.

For example, women were about twice as likely as men to forgo medications, while married adults, those living alone and those with college degrees were less likely to do so. On the flip side, larger households and respondents without college degrees reported higher rates of skipped fills.

Health insurance coverage and household income did not significantly affect these outcomes, the report noted.

The survey results also show rare bipartisan agreement on the need for more federal regulations.

Nearly two-thirds of respondents (65%), including three-quarters of Democrats and just over half (52%) of Republicans, say "there should be more government regulations that limit the price of prescription drugs."

However, overall support for pricing regulations is most influenced by income and party identification, with middle-income and Democrats being most supportive, the report pointed out.

Specifically, survey respondents with annual household incomes between $50 and 100k are about two and a half times more likely than people in other income groups to say the government should do more to regulate drug prices.

According to the report, certain regulatory changes that could help lower U.S. drug prices and increase market competition have strong bipartisan backing, particularly patent reforms.

Nearly everyone surveyed (90%) wants it to be easier for generic drugs to reach the market, for pricing to be made public, for Medicare to negotiate lower prices and for Americans to buy prescription drugs from other countries, with Democrats (85%) supporting these measures slightly more than Independents (79%) and Republicans (75%).

Notably, four out of five adults support changing patent laws to reduce drug prices, showing they favor patent reform over government price controls (65%) by a 15-point margin.

The report findings highlight that high prescription drug prices are an ongoing concern for many Americans, regardless of background or political affiliation.

Additionally, the new survey provides policymakers with evidence of broad public support for controlling prescription drug costs through "market-based solutions and targeted regulatory interventions," with patent reform standing out as a particularly viable opportunity for bipartisan collaboration.

Alivia Kaylor is a scientist and the senior site editor of Pharma Life Sciences.