Meh -- If this is the case, it would be far better to explicitly fund research and development in a separate appropriation rather than just mindlessly subsidizing all prescription meds. Calamities like the Valeant fraud would be much less common without the US dramatically overpaying for drugs.
Without the accounting fraud, they're not far off the US pharma market as a whole...
Teva is doing the same nonsense with generics, Turing did with their toxoplasmosis drug, Mallinckrodt bought Ofirmev then jacked up the price by several hundred percent, Allergan & Pfizer were trying to merge solely to tax advantage of Ireland's (and the US's) dumb IP/tax laws, GSK, Abbott, and J&J have all paid billion dollar settlements for their fraudulent marketing practices. Look at the PBMs that are suddenly worth billions of dollars purely by being middlemen between Pharma and Insurance companies.
There is so much obnoxious 'financialization' and tax optimization to justify share prices.
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/04/04/inside-the-val...