Trump says tariffs on pharmaceuticals coming soon

Are your patients' medications about to get more expensive?

President Donald Trump said Tuesday night during remarks at a dinner in Washington, D.C., that tariffs on pharmaceuticals were coming "very shortly," according to a report from Pharmaceutical Executive.

Trump's global and reciprocal tariffs, announced earlier this month, have shaken the stock market and created uncertainty in every sector of the economy, including pharmaceuticals, even though they were exempted from the initial round.

In his Tuesday remarks at a dinner event on Capitol Hill with House Republicans, Trump emphasized how his "major tariff on pharmaceuticals" would cause the industry to come rushing back to manufacture drugs stateside.

“We’re going to tariff our pharmaceuticals, and once we do that, they are going to come rushing back into our country, because we’re the big market," Trump said. "The advantage we have over everybody is that we’re the big market. So we’re going to be announcing very shortly a major tariff on pharmaceuticals, and when they hear that, they will leave China, they will leave other places, because most of their product is sold here and they’re going to be opening up their plants all over our country.”

Pharmaceuticals aren't the only health care industry impacted and looking for relief. The medical device industry has asked for exemptions from tariffs and called for reconsideration. “I am disappointed in the news of the Administration’s intent to levy broad tariffs that will negatively impact American medical technology and innovation,” Scott Whitaker, the President and CEO of AdvaMed, said in a statement.