The US fear of excessive reliance on pharmaceuticals from China began well before the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020–23. At a congressional hearing in 2019, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) reported that the United States was "no longer in the forefront of drug manufacturing." Some Congress members found that alarming, and recently former president Donald Trump suggested that a "phase-out" of US dependence on Chinese pharmaceutical imports would be accomplished within four years should he be elected president.
But expanding the trade war while barring medications and other medical…
