Mark Cuban’s self-serving prescription for higher drug prices



Promptly after President Trump’s November 5 victory, business mogul Mark Cuban deleted all his pro-Kamala Harris posts on X (formerly Twitter) — an odd move for a former top campaign surrogate to make. What he cannot delete, however, is his track record of trying to use Harris to regulate his company’s competition away. In fact, he’s escalating his anti-free-market strategy.

Cuban participated late last month in a fireside chat at the University of Pennsylvania to explain why he wants the government to regulate pharmacy benefit managers, the companies that businesses (small and large) contract with to negotiate lower drug purchase price costs with Big Pharma.

Mark Cuban should follow the rest of Wall Street’s lead, cut his losses, and move on.

Kamala Harris’ willingness to take them on appears to have factored considerably into his decision to support her as aggressively as he did. Soon after Cuban talked to Harris about PBMs, her campaign came out with a plan against them. Cuban then began stumping for the Democratic candidate in the battleground states of Arizona, Michigan, and Wisconsin.

But PBMs should not be regulated — nor should they be demonized. If they were so bad, businesses would not voluntarily pay them to lower their prescription drug costs. They continue to hire PBMs because they make things more affordable — lowering Medicare Part D spending by 20%, for example.

The true price gougers aren’t PBMs. Drug companies are responsible for 65% of the total list price of our prescriptions, and their relationships with Washington decision-makers have enabled them to raise prices above free-market levels. Mark Cuban’s company, Cost Plus Drugs, also negotiates drug prices as PBMs do, so he would benefit if the government squelches PBMs. In other words, he parrots Big Pharma’s talking points on who to blame because an anti-free-market outcome would help him personally.

That’s the problem with Cuban. He relies on political gamesmanship instead of free-market ingenuity to succeed.

While he astutely made a lot of money on dot-com businesses in the internet’s infancy, more recently, he has accrued net losses on all his “Shark Tank” deals. Working with Harris and other government officials to wipe PBMs out of the marketplace would ensure that Cost Plus Drugs has a better future than his “Shark Tank” investments — but it would come at the expense of affordable drugs for millions of Americans.

That is disturbing when, according to the American Hospital Association:

Nearly 30% of Americans say they haven't taken their medication as prescribed due to high drug prices, and it is estimated that more than 1.1 million Medicare patients alone could die over the next decade because they cannot afford to pay for their prescribed medications.

If Cuban wants to wipe his support for Harris off the internet, congratulate President Trump, and move on, that’s fine — but he should be doing the same with his failed attempt to push self-serving regulations through the White House, too. Instead, he’s amping up his efforts, and that’s in no one’s interest but his own.

Trump won't repeat Harris' mistake. His inner circle knows what's at stake if Cuban achieves his political agenda and won't let it happen. Neither will Congress. Although some lawmakers are pushing anti-PBM regulatory bills before the session ends, Trump loyalists like Sens. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Rand Paul (R-Ky.) are prepared to block them.

Pharma’s stock shares have dropped precipitously since Trump’s re-election, signaling that many investors already know this cold, hard truth.

Rather than continuing with his self-serving regulatory push, Mark Cuban should follow the rest of Wall Street’s lead, cut his losses, and move on. Maybe even focus on genuine free-market competition rather than legislative bullying. It would be better for all of us.

Canada’s ‘Doctor Death’ Has Killed Hundreds Of Patients And Counting

[rebelmouse-proxy-image https://thefederalist.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/Screenshot-2024-12-04-at-5.05.05 PM-1200x675.png crop_info="%7B%22image%22%3A%20%22https%3A//thefederalist.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/Screenshot-2024-12-04-at-5.05.05%5Cu202fPM-1200x675.png%22%7D" expand=1]One doctor has murdered more than 430 patients — not counting unborn babies. She is still practicing this twisted 'medicine.'

Republican Senator Introduces Federal Ban On Mutilating Trans Procedures For Children

Sen. Marshall introduced a federal ban on mutilating transgender procedures for minors that would punish anyone who performs such procedures.

EXCLUSIVE: Healthshare Org Urges Incoming Trump Admin To Make ‘Radical’ Change To FDA, Healthcare System

'Plagued by waste and inefficiency'

Biden-Harris HHS is blathering about transvestism this week. Here's what RFK Jr. said he'll prioritize.



President-elect Donald Trump nominated Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on Thursday to serve as Health and Human Services secretary, reiterating his pledge to "Make America Healthy Again."

Within hours of the announcement, the Biden-Harris HHS under the current leadership of Xavier Becerra provided the incoming administration with a reminder of the herculean task of reform now set before Kennedy: a propaganda piece on social media signaling support both for medicalized transvestism and the notion that some men and women are "nonbinary."

In addition to reminding the public that radical gender ideology informs the current HHS' pseudoscientific stances and activist policies — something Trump intends to remedy — the post set Kennedy's apparent health priorities in greater relief.

Rather than waste time, money, and energy indulging the delusions of those suffering from body dysmorphia, Kennedy has signaled he will actually try to improve their health and the health of the nation at large.

"We have a generational opportunity to bring together the greatest minds in science, medicine, industry, and government to put an end to the chronic disease epidemic," Kennedy said in his response to Trump's announcement. "I look forward to working with the more than 80,000 employees at HHS to free the agencies from the smothering cloud of corporate capture so they can pursue their mission to make Americans once again the healthiest people on Earth."

'I don't think children can genuinely consent to repurposed castration drugs.'

Kennedy has offered some hints and specifics in recent months about what he would do if put in a position to take meaningful federal action.

Protecting youth from the sex-change regime

In May, Kennedy tweeted, "The more I learn, the more troubled I have become about giving puberty blockers to youth. Minors cannot drive, vote, join the army, get a tattoo, smoke, or drink, because we know that children do not fully understand the consequences of decisions with life-long ramifications."

The future Trump nominee stressed that the brain's prefrontal cortex, "responsible for skills like planning, prioritizing, and making good decisions, doesn't fully mature until the early to mid-20s."

"I don't think children can genuinely consent to repurposed castration drugs (puberty blockers) and surgical mutilation, which have permanent, irreversible effects," said Kennedy.

A Kennedy-led HHS would help Trump make good on his vows to revoke the Biden-Harris administration's "cruel policies on so-called 'gender-affirming care'"; cease all programs promoting the concept of gender transition; and cut "any hospital or healthcare provider participating in the chemical or physical mutilation of minor youth" off of Medicaid and Medicare.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services is one of the HHS agencies Kennedy would oversee.

When threatening federal funding, Kennedy might want to look at the medical advocacy group Do No Harm's new database of hospitals and medical facilities that are apparently subjecting children to sex-change mutilations and sterilizing chemical treatments.

Curbing retardation by fluoride

The accomplished environmental lawyer, who once gave agro-tech giant Monsanto a figurative black eye in court, signaled that the Trump administration will "advise all U.S. water systems to remove fluoride from the public water" — a proposal that even the Washington Post's health columnist Leana Wen, a professor of health policy at George Washington University Milken Institute School of Public Health, has admitted is reasonable.

According to the National Institutes of Health's Office of Dietary Supplements, fluoridated municipal drinking water accounts for approximately 60% of fluoride intakes in the United States. As of 2020, 62.9% of the population had access to a fluoridated water system.

Scientists have long understood that exposure to fluoride at elevated levels has been linked to various adverse health effects in humans, such as osteosclerosis, calcification of tendons, endocrine dysfunction, and bone deformities. The government finally got around to admitting this past summer that fluoride is also retarding the population.

The National Toxicology Program, part of the HHS, released a report in August revealing that fluoridated water can significantly lower IQ in kids.

"Higher estimated fluoride exposures (e.g., as in approximations of exposure such as drinking water fluoride concentrations that exceed the World Health Organization Guidelines for Drinking-water Quality of 1.5 mg/L of fluoride) are consistently associated with lower IQ in children," said the NTP report.

'FDA's war on public health is about to end.'

When still a presidential candidate, Kennedy made the same pledge to remove fluoride from the water, stating he would lean on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, another HHS agency to "take every step necessary to remove neurotoxic fluoride from American drinking water."

Cleaning house at the FDA

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is another HHS agency, meaning it would be within Kennedy's purview.

Ahead of Election Day, Kennedy noted on X, "FDA's war on public health is about to end. This includes its aggressive suppression of psychedelics, peptides, stem cells, raw milk, hyperbaric therapies, chelating compounds, ivermectin, hydroxychloroquine, vitamins, clean foods, sunshine, exercise, nutraceuticals and anything else that advances human health and can't be patented by Pharma."

"If you work for the FDA and are part of this corrupt system, I have two messages for you: 1. Preserve your records, and 2. Pack your bags," added Kennedy.

Kennedy told MSNBC following Trump's landslide victory, "In some categories, there are entire departments, like the nutrition department at the FDA that are — that have to go, that are not doing their job, they're not protecting our kids."

Kennedy underscored he would not seek to eliminate entire agencies "as long as it requires congressional approval." Instead, he would "get the corruption out of the agencies."

Trump said in his announcement Thursday that the HHS would also "ensure that everybody will be protected from harmful chemicals, pollutants, pesticides, pharmaceutical products, and food additives that have contributed to the overwhelming Health Crisis in this Country."

With oversight of the FDA, Kennedy might be able to spare Americans from exposure or at the very least relatively high exposure to problematic chemicals such as chlormequat and Bisphenol A.

The Journal of Exposure Science and Environmental Epidemiology published a study from the Environmental Working Group earlier this year revealing that the vast majority of Americans have been exposed to the pesticide chlormequat, which is detectable in dozens of popular oat-based products and has been linked in animal studies to disrupted fetal growth, damage to the reproductive system, delayed puberty, and reduced fertility.

'The science on vaccine safety particularly has huge deficits.'

Blaze News previously reported that BPA, which studies have linked to infertility, obesity, cancer, poor fetal development, early onset puberty, type 2 diabetes, heart disease, and other ailments, is used in numerous rigid plastic consumer products. While the current FDA claims the chemical is safe at "current levels occurring in foods," a European health agency recently sounded the alarm, revealing that exposure is too high and that contrary to the suggestion of the FDA, BPA does pose a danger.

Kennedy has expressed an interest in banning various chemicals, including the food dye tartrazine, stressing the need to "stop the mass poisoning of American children."

Proper vaccine research

Kennedy told NPR in a recent interview that he would act swiftly on support for vaccine research.

"I will work immediately on that. That will be one of my priorities," said Kennedy.

Kennedy and Dr. Brian Hooker released a book last year, titled "Vax-Unvax: Let the Science Speak," which examined the scientific literature highlighting health differences between vaccinated and unvaccinated populations. In the book, Kennedy reportedly states, "There is virtually no science assessing the overall health effects of the vaccination schedule or its component vaccines."

"This means it can’t know whether these vaccines actually cause harm and certainly can’t honestly say that they don’t," the book adds.

"We're not going to take vaccines away from anybody. We are going to make sure that Americans have good information right now. The science on vaccine safety particularly has huge deficits, and we're going to make sure those scientific studies are done and that people can make informed choices about their vaccinations and their children's vaccinations."

The Washington Post suggested with apparent unease that Kennedy could influence the vaccine approval and recommendation process by directing less passive and deferential individuals onto advisory committees at the FDA and CDC.

Unsurprisingly, shares of major vaccine makers, such as Pfizer and Moderna, took a nosedive following news of Kennedy's appointment.

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California sues Catholic hospital for refusing to abort twins after mother's water broke



California's Democratic Attorney General Rob Bonta continued his crusade against pro-life institutions Monday, filing a lawsuit against a Catholic hospital, Providence St. Joseph of Eureka, for not promptly aborting a mother's twins.

"With today's lawsuit, I want to make this clear for all Californians: Abortion care is health care. You have the right to access timely and safe abortion services," said Bonta. "At the California Department of Justice, we will use the full force of this office to hold accountable those who, like Providence, are breaking the law."

According to the complaint, Anna Nusslock visited Providence after her water prematurely broke and she began bleeding. A doctor allegedly diagnosed Nusslock, then 15 weeks pregnant, with previable premature pre-labor rupture of membranes and told the mother that while both twins had heart tones, one of them was sure to perish and the fate of the other baby was uncertain.

Another doctor at University of California San Francisco Medical Center told Nusslock over the phone that there was only a remote chance that the second twin might survive.

'We have a hospital implementing a policy that's reminiscent of heartbeat laws in extremist red states.'

The hospital, which recently saved the life of a baby boy born 96 days early, allegedly informed Nusslock that policy precluded medical professionals there from providing an an "emergency" abortion as long as one of the babies had a "detectable heartbeat" or unless there was an immediate risk to Nusslock's life.

"It is damning that here in California, where abortion care is a constitutional right, we have a hospital implementing a policy that's reminiscent of heartbeat laws in extremist red states," Bonta said of the apparent policy against elective abortions.

The complaint noted that the hospital initially recommended that Nusslock be helicoptered to the University of California San Francisco Medical Center, but she declined, unwilling to be separated from her husband and convinced that her insurance would not cover the cost. The hospital then allegedly discharged Nusslock with free towels and instructions to drive to Mad River Community Hospital, roughly 20 minutes away.

The lawsuit accuses the hospital of violating the Unruh Civil Rights Act, violating the health code's nonmedical transfer provision, and violating the state's Emergency Services Law, which requires hospitals to provide care "necessary to relieve or eliminate the emergency medical condition."

A spokesman for the hospital said in a statement to ABC News that "Providence is deeply committed to the health and wellness of women and pregnant patients and provides emergency services to all who walk through our doors in accordance with state and federal law. We are heartbroken over Dr. Nusslock's experience earlier this year."

"This morning was the first Providence had heard of the California attorney general's lawsuit, and we are currently reviewing the filings to understand what is being alleged," continued the spokesman. "Because this case is in active litigation and due to patient confidentiality, we cannot comment on the matter," the spokesperson added.

In his remarks, Bonta bemoaned the U.S. Supreme Court's recent refusal to qualify abortion as among the varieties of "stabilizing care" required of every hospital with an emergency department participating in Medicare under the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act.

Without such a federal mandate conflating stability with the termination of human life, Bonta indicated that "states like California have to rely on their own state laws to protect pregnant patients."

Bonta has not only worked to combat policies ostensibly designed to protect life in his state but in other states as well. Last year, he joined New York Attorney General Letitia James in leading a coalition to back the Biden-Harris administration's challenge to Idaho's popular and democratically passed pro-life law. They failed.

Bonta also sued Heartbeat International last year and a chain of crisis pregnancy centers over their promotion of medical abortion reversal. That case has yet to be decided.

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State-facilitated suicide is now a leading cause of death in Canada



State-facilitated suicide is now a leading cause of death north of the border, according to a new report from the Canadian think tank Cardus. In the way of body counts, euthanasia under Canada's eugenicist-founded health care system may have already edged out what was previously the fifth-leading cause of death, cerebrovascular diseases.

Canada legalized euthanasia in 2016, referring to it euphemistically as medical assistance in dying. According to Cardus, court rulings emphasized early on that MAID should be a "stringently limited, carefully monitored system of exceptions." It appears that MAID has become anything but.

"MAiD in Canada is no longer unusual or rare. Federal predictions about the expected frequency of MAiD have significantly underestimated the numbers of Canadians who are dying by this means," said the report. "More troubling, instead of physicians acting as 'reluctant gatekeepers' for assisted dying, as the lawyers for the plaintiff in Carter envisioned, they appear highly favourable to MAiD requests, as shown by the available data on length of time from assessment to provision, the percentage of MAiD requests that are denied, and the sheer prevalence of occurrences."

Blaze News previously indicated that in its first year, MAID killed 1,108 Canadians. That number tripled the following year, and by 2021, the number had climbed to over 10,000 assisted-suicide deaths a year in a country with an overall population of less than 39 million. State-facilitated suicides jumped another 31% in 2022, accounting for over 4% of deaths in Canada.

"We've seen that between 2016 and 2022, deaths from euthanasia have grown 13 times higher than when we originally started,” study author Alexander Raikin, a visiting fellow with the Washington, D.C.-based Ethics and Public Policy Center, told Postmedia. "In short, Canada has the fastest-growing euthanasia regime of anywhere in the world."

In 2022, there were reportedly 84,412 Canadian cancer deaths; 57,357 deaths resultant from diseases of the heart; 19,716 alleged COVID-19 deaths; and 18,365 accidental deaths.

According to Cardus, MAID and cerebrovascular diseases — a condition group that includes aneurysms, carotid stenosis, and stroke — were neck and neck for fifth place. There were 13,915 deaths from cerebrovascular diseases and 13,241 deaths from MAID in 2022.

'If it can happen there, it can here.'

While it appears cerebrovascular diseases have a numerical edge over state-facilitated suicides in terms of victims, Cardus indicated Statistics Canada possibly counted MAID deaths toward its cerebrovascular disease total as it does not recognize MAID as a cause of death. That would mean it's too close to call.

Not only is MAID killing many moribund people, it's killing people who could otherwise live for years or decades, as well as victims whose primary symptom is suicidal ideation.

Originally, those seeking MAID had to be at least 18 years of age with a "grievous and irremediable medical condition" causing "enduring physical or psychological suffering that is intolerable" to them. Additionally, they had to be in an "advanced state of irreversible decline," with death a likely outcome in the foreseeable future.

The rules have been loosened in the years since, such that those with PTSD, depression, anxiety, and other survivable issues can be put down.

According to the report, there is ample evidence now indicating that "medical professionals are not viewing MAiD as an option of last resort only."

"In less than a decade, euthanasia has gone from being a rare exception — as was originally intended by proponents, by policymakers, by the courts, by even the lead lawyer for the plaintiff in Carter v. Canada, to a routine cause of death in Canada," said Raikin.

It appears some in Ottawa may regard euthanasia as a way to save money and ease strain on a socialized health care system burdened by massive influxes of immigrants under the Trudeau government.

Canada's Office of the Parliamentary Budget Officer highlighted in an October 2020 report that "expanding access to MAID will result in a net reduction in health care costs for the provincial governments" — saving those governments hundreds of millions of dollars that would otherwise be spent on saving lives and providing Canadians with the treatment they paid for as taxpayers.

Wesley J. Smith, a senior fellow at the Discovery Institute's Center on Human Exceptionalism, recently said of Cardus' findings, "If it can happen there, it can here. The only sure preventative is to reject the assisted-suicide agenda while it remains relatively limited in scope and reinvigorate the ethical tenets of Hippocratic medicine."

Smith is right to be concerned.

Last week, Gallup revealed that the majority of Americans now support legal euthanasia.

71% of respondents indicated that doctors should be "allowed by law to end the patient's life by some painless means if the patient and his or her family request it." 66% said doctors should be allowed to assist their patients in offing themselves.

Despite this overwhelming support, only 53% of Americans indicated doctor-assisted suicide was morally acceptable; 40% said it was morally wrong.

It's clear that religion plays a role in shaping views on whether it's acceptable for white-jacketed professionals to exterminate their patients. 77% of Americans with no religious identity said doctor-assisted suicide was morally acceptable. Meanwhile, only 46% of "Protestant/Other Christian" and 44% of Catholics said the same.

Opposition was strongest (66%) among those respondents who admitted of weekly religious attendance. Only 28% of those with seldom or no religious attendance signaled opposition.

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Kamala Harris Fails To Distance Herself From Left-Wing 2020 Campaign, Despite Aides’ Best Efforts

Kamala Harris Fails To Distance Herself From Left-Wing 2020 Campaign, Despite Aides' Best Efforts

Texas requires hospitals to collect, report health care costs for illegal aliens



Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) issued an executive order on Thursday that will require the state’s public hospitals to collect and report health care expenses for illegal immigrants. A press release from Abbott’s office stated that the executive action aims to track the costs of the Biden-Harris administration open-border crisis.

The Texas Health and Human Services Commission will be required to “collect information on illegal immigrants who use Texas public hospitals for inpatient and emergency care and to report incurred healthcare cost.” HHSC will provide annual reporting to the governor and the Texas legislature, which will be used to request financial reimbursement from the federal government.

To track such information, hospitals will ask patients about their immigration status and collect information regarding the costs associated with their care. Hospitals under HHSC will be required to submit quarterly reports to the commission. HHSC will begin collecting this information starting no later than November 1.

“The surge of individuals unlawfully crossing the Texas-Mexico border posed an ongoing and imminent threat of disaster for a number of Texas counties and for all state agencies by this disaster,” the executive order read. “The surge of individuals crossing the southern border has continued, resulting in more than 11 million people—a number larger than the population of 40 different States—entering this country illegally in less than four years under the Biden-Harris Administration.”

The executive order requests hospitals to inform patients that their responses to immigration status questions will not impact the care they receive.

Abbott released a statement regarding the new executive order, saying, “Due to President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris’ open border policies, Texas has had to foot the bill for medical costs for individuals illegally in the state.”

“Texans should not have to shoulder the burden of financially supporting medical care for illegal immigrants,” Abbott continued. “That is why today I issued an Executive Order requiring the Texas Health and Human Services Commission to collect and report healthcare costs for illegal immigrants in our state. Texas will hold the Biden-Harris Administration accountable for the consequences of their open border policies, and we will fight to ensure that they pay back Texas for their costly and dangerous policies.”

U.S. Rep. Sylvia Garcia (D-Texas) responded in opposition to the governor’s order.

“Here we go again,” Garcia stated. “Our MAGA Republican Governor just can’t stop social engineering. First, he wants doctors and nurses to police women’s choices for reproductive care, then he wants to make criminals out of parents who support their child in seeking gender-affirming care, and now he wants to make ICE officers out of doctors providing immigrants with medical care.”

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It Did Not Take Long For Harris’ Campaign To Start Backtracking On Her Left-Wing Positions

'Forgiving of authenticity than they are of bullshit anonymous statements'