Right to Try Is Unleashing the Future of Medicine

This is the third piece in a four-part series about Right to Try at the federal and state levels and the response from the private sector. The first piece defines Right to Try and explains its importance to patients. The second piece discusses the passage of federal Right to Try legislation.

Less than a decade ago, the grassroots Right to Try movement was born out of the premise that patients facing a terminal illness should not have to beg the federal government for permission to save their own lives. The concerns of patients, doctors, policymakers and advocates led to a legislative solution: Right to Try, a law that puts the most personal healthcare decisions back where they belong, with patients and their families. Ultimately, 41 states passed Right to Try laws with overwhelming bipartisan support. At last, in 2018, the federal version of Right to Try was signed into law, protecting patients throughout the U.S.

Today, Right to Try is delivering on its promise: Patients across the country have access to treatments they wouldn’t otherwise have. But Right to Try is also paving the way for a better tomorrow by encouraging innovation in the private sector. It allows treatment manufacturers and doctors to treat, learn and innovate in exciting ways that wouldn’t have been possible under the bureaucratic healthcare system before Right to Try.

Read the rest of the op-ed at Discourse Magazine.