President Donald Trump speaks during a meeting of the cabinet in the house of the White House cabinet in Washington, DC, April 30, 2025.
Jim Watson | AFP | Getty images
President Donald Trump signed an executive decree on Monday to encourage the manufacture of drugs in the United States, rationalizing the path of pharmaceutical companies to build new production sites in the United States.
The order will allow the Food and Drug Administration to carry out more inspections of new manufacturing sites with the same resources, the agency commissioner said Marty Makary on Monday. The FDA will also increase inspections of foreign drug installations, passing from “surprise” visits announced abroad, he said.
“We had this crazy system in the United States where manufacturers of American pharmaceutical products … went through the ringtone with inspections, and foreign sites become much easier with the planned visits, while we have surprise visits,” said Makary.
“Nor are we going that our inspectors drag for three or four weeks,” he added.
The order becomes before Trump’s planned prices on pharmaceutical products imported into the United States, these potential samples – and efforts to build goodwill with the president – have already fueled a new wave of national manufacturers of drug manufacturers such as Eli Lilly,, Johnson & Johnson And Abbvie.
Trump told journalists on Monday that he will announce pharmaceutical rates in the next two weeks. His administration revealed in April that it had opened an investigation known as article 232 on how the import of certain pharmaceutical products affects national security – a decision widely considered as a prelude to obtaining tariffs on drugs.
Some pharmaceutical companies are starting to postpone Trump’s plans. For example, the CEO of Pfizer, Albert Bourla, said last week that the price threat dissuades the company from making new American investments in research and development and manufacturing.
American manufacturing in the pharmaceutical industry has decreased considerably in recent decades. The production of most so-called ingredients active in drugs has moved to China and other countries, largely due to the drop in labor costs and other parts of the process, according to the Food and Drug Administration.
The United States imported $ 203 billion in pharmaceutical products in only 2023, with 73% from Europe, mainly Ireland, Germany and Switzerland, according to the analysis carried out by the consulting company EY.
Manufacturing remodeling can help make the supply chain more robust medication, which reduces the risk of disturbances, according to a GlobalData, a data and analysis company. However, this could increase production costs and drug prices, which has raised accessibility problems, said Globaldata.