Fact Check: Biden Said He Brought Down Insulin Costs to $15 Per Shot. Here's What's True and What's Not
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Claim:
U.S. President Joe Biden accurately said he lowered the price of a shot of insulin, to $15 per shot from $400.
Rating:
Mixture (About this rating?)
What's True:
Under the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, U.S. President Joe Biden lowered the cost of insulin for seniors on Medicare.
What's False:
However, the numbers he cited during the June 2024 presidential debate were inaccurate. The Inflation Reduction Act capped insulin at $35 per month for seniors on Medicare, not $15 per shot. And insulin users on Medicare spent an average of $449 per year on insulin, not $400 per shot.
On June 27, 2024, U.S. President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump faced each other for the first debate of the 2024 presidential election.
Following the first question, regarding the economy, Biden claimed that he brought down the cost of a shot of insulin, to $15 from $400. "We brought down the price of prescription drugs, which is a major issue for many people, to $15 for an insulin shot, as opposed to $400," he said (viewable at 4:41 in the video):
We looked into the claim, and found that while it's true that Biden brought the price of insulin down, the numbers he cited were not correct, so we have rated this claim a "Mixture" of truth and falsehood.
Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act into law in August 2022, codifying measures that capped the cost of insulin for seniors on Medicare at $35 per month starting in January 2023. As a result, many drugmakers — including Eli Lilly, the largest manufacturer of insulin in the U.S. — lowered their prices accordingly.
According to a 2022 study by the Department of Health and Human Services, insulin users on Medicare paid an average of $449 annually. Contrary to Biden's claim, a shot of insulin did not cost $400 before the Inflation Reduction Act.
The Snopes newsroom fact-checked the first debate of the 2024 presidential election in real time, available here.
Sources:
'Here's a Look at Some of the False Claims Made during Biden and Trump's First Debate'. AP News, 27 June 2024, https://apnews.com/article/fact-check-misinformation-election-debate-trump-biden-577507522762aa10f6ee5be3a0ced2bb.
House, The White. 'FACT SHEET: President Biden's Cap on the Cost of Insulin Could Benefit Millions of Americans in All 50 States'. The White House, 2 Mar. 2023, https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2023/03/02/fact-sheet-president-bidens-cap-on-the-cost-of-insulin-could-benefit-millions-of-americans-in-all-50-states/.
Report on the Affordability of Insulin. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 16 Dec. 2022, https://aspe.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/documents/b60f396f32e29a2a9469276d9ca80e4b/aspe-insulin-affordibility-rtc.pdf.
Staff, Snopes. 'Fact-Checking the 2024 Presidential Debate'. Snopes, 27 June 2024, https://www.snopes.com//news/2024/06/27/presidential-debate-live-updates/.
The Wall Street Journal. Full Debate: Biden and Trump in the First 2024 Presidential Debate | WSJ. 2024. YouTube, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qqG96G8YdcE.