Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and three other legislators on the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee launched an investigation into inhalers, calling the prices "outrageous."
The senators sent letters to the nation's four largest manufacturers of inhalers: AstraZeneca, Boehringer Ingelheim, GSK and Teva Pharmaceuticals. In the U.S., inhalers cost between $200 and $600 from these companies, but in France, Germany and the U.K., the same products are sold for as low as $7.
More than 25 million Americans have asthma and about 16 million have chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, according to the letters. Every year, 3,500 die from asthma — deaths that could be prevented by lower costs, the senators said.
"Access to inhalers can mean the difference between life and a suffocating death," Sen. Ben Ray Luján, D-N.M., said in a news release. "It's wrong that so many Americans suffering from asthma and COPD cannot afford their inhalers."
The letters ask the four companies to explain manufacturing costs, budgets for asthma and COPD research, and internal decisions on creating new features and their clinical benefits.