House Democrats blocked a bill Tuesday that would have paved the way to allow people with life-threatening illnesses to try medicines that are still undergoing testing.
The bill did not reach the two-thirds majority threshold it needed to pass, falling seven votes shy at 259 yays and 140 nays. Democrats said they were largely concerned about threats to patients’ safety.
The bill, known as the Right to Try Act, had passed the Senate under unanimous consent last year. Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., who introduced the Senate version of the bill, presided over the vote on the House floor.
The legislation had the support of President Trump, who called on Congress to pass it during his State of the Union address, and from Vice President Mike Pence, who signed a right-to-try bill into law when he was governor of Indiana.
Similar right-to-try laws have been passed in at least 38 states, but they are not allowed to circumvent federal law that says drugs must be approved by the Food and Drug Administration before they can be given to patients. Under the bill, patients would have been able to request access to medicines as long as they had passed the first phase of scientific review, which determines whether a medication is safe for people but not whether it works. Drug companies would not be required to provide the drugs to patients who request them.
Supporters of the bill said that patients should have the right to take drugs that might save their lives when they have no other options. Critics said the policy undermined the government’s oversight process. They also pointed out that the FDA already allows for patients to have some access through a program known as “compassionate use.” Under that process, an expert on an advisory board must approve the request, and 99 percent of requests are approved.
During floor speeches ahead of the vote, Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick, R-Pa., said the “compassionate use” process doesn’t help enough people, noting it is used by roughly 1,200 patients a year.
“When a life stands in the balance, the federal governments should not stand in the way of potentially life-saving treatment,” Fitzpatrick said.
But Rep. Frank Pallone, D-N.J., top Democrat on the Energy and Commerce Committee, said the bill would deliver false hope to patients and their families, whom he said will think they may have access to a cure. He called the bill “nothing more than right to ask for access to unproven treatments” and said the treatments “may do more harm than good,” particularly because they wouldn’t have oversight from the FDA.
“We must protect patients from bad actors or unsafe treatments that would make their lives worse,” he said.
He also criticized the process of advancing the legislation, which had been unveiled soon before the vote.
“This bill should have never been on the House floor in the first place since it was only introduced today and has never been reviewed or discussed by our committee,” he said after the vote.
Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Greg Walden, R-Ore, and Health Subcommittee Chairman Michael Burgess, R-Texas, said they had worked on the bill for months and sought to strike a balance between allowing better access and ensuring patient protections.
This bill does just that, with more robust informed consent and real-time reporting, as well as requiring FDA notification of participation,” they said. “This bill is fair, reasonable, and is deserving of Democratic support.”
The bill had the support of outside conservative groups, including Freedom Partners, a nonprofit that is partially funded by the Koch brothers. Nathan Nascimento, executive vice president for the group, said in a statement that he was “extremely disappointed” by the bill’s failure.
“The Right to Try Act could make all the difference for thousands of terminally ill patients and their families who are desperately searching for access to potentially life-saving treatments and medication,” he said. “We are extremely disappointed that while those patients have no time to waste, members of Congress failed today to pass common sense legislation that would extend to them the hope they both need and deserve.”
