New medical reform or ban on plant medicine in the United States

The new health care reform bill passed by the U.S Senate on March 23 and signed by President Barack Obama is a major event in American history According to the analysis, the new law means that from now on, health insurance will cover 94% of the US residents, and at least 75% of the 47 million Americans who have not yet taken part in health insurance will be covered by health insurance According to the analysis, one of the essence of the new health care reform act in the United States is to reduce the drug cost of some common diseases, which means that in the future, hospitals around the United States will use more generic drugs, rather than expensive patented drugs, so as to save the total medical expenses China is the world's largest producer and exporter of APIs, and the United States is China's traditional export market The introduction of the new healthcare reform act in the United States will obviously have an impact on the export of pharmaceutical raw materials in China According to statistics, China exported 6.2 billion US dollars of medical and health care raw materials to the United States last year, including 2.4 billion US dollars of generic API exports In terms of the total value of imported APIs (nearly US $60 billion) in that year, China's API exports to the United States are not high So far, more than 300 APIs from dozens of pharmaceutical companies in China have passed the inspection of FDA in the United States It is expected that these APIs will have a good opportunity to expand exports after the formal implementation of the new medical reform program in the United States in the next few years What's more noteworthy is that the U.S government's health authorities are studying the phytodrug system in Germany and other Western European countries It has been proved that the use of botanical drugs in Germany, Britain and other countries has greatly reduced medical costs and received good results In Europe, many countries have "banned" botanical drugs The annual sales volume of botanical drugs in Europe is about US $700 million In recent years, China's export volume of botanical extracts to Europe is also increasing As the largest pharmaceutical market in the world, there is no Pharmacopoeia of plant medicine in the United States Although there are hundreds of botanical preparations in the pharmaceutical market of the United States, they are actually sold in the name of "dietary supplements" and are not drugs As a result of this discrimination, botanical preparations have long been regarded as "alternative health care products" in the U.S market, and botanical drug manufacturers have also been suppressed in the U.S Whether the position of botanical drugs in the United States is likely to change fundamentally in the future depends on the attitude of the U.S health authorities If the United States can follow the European countries' practice of universal health insurance to implement the "list of commonly used drugs for national medical insurance" system, and include the plant medicine in the scope of patients' medical reimbursement, the plant medicine will achieve a qualitative leap in the U.S market, and bring new growth hope for Chinese medicine manufacturers with huge capacity.