New twist on 'reasonable pricing'

WASHINGTON - The latest attempt to reinstate the "reasonable pricing" clause into NIH Cooperative Research and Development Agreements adds a new wrinkle to the debate. New legislation, introduced last week, proposes to require competitive bidding based on a company's plans for price restraint on products developing using federally funded research.

A dozen members of Congress have signed onto the proposed Health Care Research and Development Taxpayer Protection Act (H.R. 3758), which would require that "consideration shall be given to mechanisms for determining reasonable prices which are based upon a competitive bidding process" before exclusive rights to federally funded research are transferred to a private company...