בקונגרס האמריקני דנים כיצד להשתחרר מהאחיזה הסינית בתעשיית התרופות

America's medicine supply chain is at risk. Roughly 90% of drugs that Americans use daily run through Chinese-controlled inputs. Lawmakers exploring the issue in a public hearing Wednesday. And today's Melina Weisskopf has the takeaways. In the last five years, China went from zero to 48% of large global pharmaceutical licensing deals. Chairman of the Select Committee on the CCP emphasized that for most of American history, medicines were made in our country or made somewhere we trusted. But that's no longer true, and it's a problem many Americans are unaware of. Witnesses emphasized today that this didn't happen naturally through market forces. It was an intentional design by the Chinese Communist Party. They don't look at it as a business enterprise. I believe they look at it as a strategic asset that they can use to leverage against us. So the cost of production is irrelevant to them. They're going to drive, they'll work to drive anybody out of business if they have to. Patrick Cashman is the last remaining U.S.-based manufacturer of amoxicillin, the most commonly prescribed antibiotics. Through decades of Chinese state subsidies and low environmental standards, the CCP drove Western competitors out of the market. The goal? To put Western countries in a bind. In a conflict scenario or even a targeted export restriction, Americans are going to die because of this. I want this committee to understand that this hearing is not about the supply chain. Vulnerabilities we've already accepted, as serious as those are, it's about where China's going next. The question at the front and center, how can the U.S. increase access to crucial medicines and protect Americans from the CCP leveraging public health in its unrestricted warfare against the U.S.? Whether the top targeted actions we should take right now to reduce our dependence on China for essential medicines that patients rely on every day. Full onshoring of those medicines, including figuring out ways to make the key starting materials here, either chemically or using synthetic biology, is the way to do this. The witnesses emphasize that the keys to moving toward loosening China's grip on our medicine supply involve investment in domestic manufacturers and working with allies. Reporting from Washington, D.C., Melina Weiskopf, NTD News.