Incoming PhRMA Chair Paul Hudson, a day before the White House announcement, pledged to work with the administration as the president turns to insurers as a source of cost savings for prescription medicines.
President Donald Trump unveiled “The Great Healthcare Plan” on Thursday, calling on Congress to enact changes to lower drug prices and insurance premiums and stretch Most Favored Nation drug pricing beyond the 17 pharma companies that were targeted last year.
Speaking with reporters on Wednesday in San Francisco, Sanofi CEO—and PhRMA’s next board chair—Paul Hudson, had pledged to work with the administration on any drug pricing action that targeted insurers. Trump’s actions seem to confirm what Hudson and other leaders suspected would be next from the administration on the drug pricing issue.
The plan outline calls on Congress to codify the Most Favored Nation deal, although details were not provided. On lowering insurance premiums, the plan suggests that money will be sent directly to Americans while insurance companies will be required to disclose rate and coverage comparisons in “Plain English.”
“Instead of putting the needs of big corporations and special interests first our plan finally puts you first and puts more money in your pocket,” Trump said in a statement. “The government is going to pay the money directly to you. It goes to you, and then you take the money and buy your own healthcare… the big insurance companies lose and the people of our country win.”
The day before the announcement, Hudson stressed that the industry wants to be involved in advising on future drug pricing policy, preferably through organizations like PhRMA that can represent the interests of the entire industry.
“I did say this to some of [Trump’s] advisors, when we were in the White House, that I prefer for them to deal with PhRMA, because there’s a large group of companies that don’t have a deal exactly, and what are they left with?” Hudson said.
Over the fourth quarter of 2025, a handful of companies—kicked off by Pfizer—signed individual deals with the Trump administration to lower the cost of certain therapies in their portfolios. The White House also proposed TrumpRx, a direct-to-consumer platform that promises to offer the lowest prescription drug prices in America. The site has yet to launch.
Hudson suspected that there may be a “catch all” policy effort to come that would collect the remaining drug companies that have not signed deals.
Whether The Great Healthcare Plan will do that is unclear. The provisions will require codification from a divided Congress.
Hudson says his goal as incoming chair of PhRMA is to make sure that Most Favored Nation drug pricing negotiations come to an end.
“The things I’m interested in as incoming chair is trying to make sure that this round of MFN is the round, and that we’re vigilant enough to know that we we’ve all paid a price, and hopefully that will be the conclusion.”
