Biopharmaceutical Innovation
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The world is entering a promising golden age of life sciences innovation, with potentially enormous benefits for human health, productivity, and sustainability. But that vision is at risk from a host of forces that seek to hamper the fundamental business models that have enabled such innovation. ITIF’s Center for Life Sciences Innovation exists to fight back against such forces, while documenting the importance of life science innovation and the private-sector led model complemented by government support that has been so successful elevate. We conduct research, generate policy proposals, and convene members of the analytical and policymaking communities with this mission firmly in focus.
Vice President, Global Innovation Policy, and Director, Center for Life Sciences Innovation
Information Technology and Innovation Foundation
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Evidence to Inform Biopharmaceutical Policy: A Call for Research on the Impact of Public Policies on Investment in Drug Development
The scope and magnitude of the trade-off between immediate savings from lower drug prices and future health benefits from clinical development remain poorly understood and quantified. To support rigorous evaluations and inform evidence-based policymaking, it is crucial to invest in this area through research grants and improved access to federal and private data.
Evidence-Based Biopharmaceutical Policymaking: Symposium Report
There is a need for more rigorous evidence and more recent, high-quality data to inform biopharmaceutical policymaking by shedding light on the relationship between pharmaceutical firms’ expectations of financial returns from new drugs and their ability to invest in further R&D to discover future generations of drugs.
How Skeptics Misconstrue the Link Between Drug Prices and Innovation
A recent article in the British Medical Journal contends “high drug prices” are neither necessary nor justified to sustain biopharmaceutical innovation. But it misrepresents and misinterprets the facts, highlighting how faulty the rationale is for drug price controls.
The Hidden Toll of Drug Price Controls: Fewer New Treatments and Higher Medical Costs for the World
When nations implement pharmaceutical price controls, they reduce pharmaceutical revenues, which then reduces investments in further R&D, limiting future generations’ access to new novel treatments needed to fight diseases such as cancer, Alzheimer’s, heart disease, and diabetes.
Testimony to the Senate Finance Committee on “Prescription Drug Price Inflation”
Expenditures for retail prescriptions have been roughly stable for the past two decades as a share of total U.S. health-care expenditures. Instead of applying broad price controls, policymakers should promote affordability and mitigate out-of-pocket costs for individuals.
More Publications and Events
December 18, 2025|Blogs
US Brain Drain Threatens Scientific and Biopharmaceutical Leadership
The United States risks a serious brain drain as NIH funding cuts, canceled grants, and program rollbacks push early-career scientists abroad, threatening America’s long-term biomedical capacity, innovation leadership, and national competitiveness unless policymakers act to stabilize and strengthen research support.
December 18, 2025|Testimonies & Filings
Comments to OSTP Regarding Accelerating the American Scientific Enterprise
The science community must move beyond the linear model of scientific research developed and encouraged by Vannevar Bush, and realign scientific exploration with national interests, especially in the face of the growing technological and economic threat posed by China.
December 15, 2025|Reports & Briefings
How NIH-Funded Science Supports US Biopharmaceutical Innovation
NIH-funded research supports the foundation for industry to develop vaccines and therapies, exemplifying deep public-private R&D complementarity. As global competition intensifies, expanding NIH funding will be key to protecting American health, supporting U.S. biopharmaceutical competitiveness, and ensuring national power and security.
November 17, 2025|Blogs
Fact of the Week: Since the IRA’s Passage, the Number of Small-Molecule Cancer Treatments Entering Post-Approval Trials Has Fallen by 45.3 Percent
Since the Inflation Reduction Act's passage, the number of industry-supported small-molecule cancer treatments entering post-approval trials in the United States has fallen by 45.3 percent.
November 3, 2025|Blogs
Fact of the Week: University Patents Underpinned 50 Percent of FDA-approved Drugs
Since the Bayh-Dole Act was passed 50 percent of FDA-approved drugs today rely on (at least some) applied research originating in universities.
October 28, 2025|Presentations
Data-Driven Approaches to Understanding China's Technological Emergence
Sandra Barbosu spoke on a panel about competition in biotechnology at a conference hosted by the Asia Society of Northern California.
October 20, 2025|Events
Beyond the Scale: The Economic Power of GLP-1 Therapies
Join ITIF on Capitol Hill for a timely discussion on how GLP-1 therapies can transform health and economic outcomes—and what policymakers should do to maximize their benefits.
October 10, 2025|Blogs
New Research Shows How Strict Data Regulations Undercut Biopharmaceutical R&D
Strict data privacy laws like the GDPR have significantly reduced biopharmaceutical R&D investment—especially among smaller firms—highlighting the need for U.S. policymakers to reform HIPAA, pass innovation-friendly federal privacy legislation, and invest in privacy-enhancing technologies to protect both privacy and progress in medical research.
October 7, 2025|Blogs
Taxing University Royalties Would Deliver Few Benefits, but Great Harms
A new proposal to tax university patent royalties would do little to benefit taxpayers while undermining the Bayh-Dole system that drives U.S. innovation, risking America’s global leadership in turning research into real-world breakthroughs.
October 1, 2025|Presentations
No Data, No AI
Sandra Barbosu speaks on a panel about how the quality, cost and accessibility of data affect the quality of AI at the Economist's AI in Health Summit.
