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Our New Ad Campaign Shows What Lower Drug Prices Mean for Real People

En español | The average retail price for some of the most commonly used brand-name drugs has surged more than 300 percent over the last 15 years, at times forcing older adults to choose between their medication and other expenses. Thanks to the new Inflation Reduction Act, which empowers Medicare to negotiate drug prices and caps Medicare recipients’ out-of-pocket prescription costs, among other things, relief is on the way. 

We’re rolling out a new ad explaining what the law will mean for older adults who have for decades overpaid for the medicine they need. It features an AARP member from Georgia, Gretchen V., whose husband stopped taking his medication because the couple could no longer afford it. He then suffered a stroke.

“Thanks to AARP, a new law will protect seniors with a cap on prescription costs,” Gretchen says in the new spot. “That could have changed everything for us.”

The new law will also penalize drug companies that raise prices faster than the rate of inflation and make most vaccines free through Medicare starting in January, and monthly insulin costs in Medicare will be capped at $35 per month. President Joe Biden signed the bill into law last month.

As the bill advanced through Congress in recent months, we ramped up pressure on elected officials to make prescription drugs more affordable. AARP CEO Jo Ann Jenkins traveled to Capitol Hill to advocate for the bill, and we sent petitions signed by more than 4 million Americans to lawmakers — in addition to thousands of calls and emails from AARP activists — urging them to take action. Since its passage, we’ve launched a new ad campaign spreading awareness of the new law and our fight to get it over the finish line. Jenkins also released a video thanking our nearly 38 million members for helping enact these historic prescription drug reforms.

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