FTC Competition Priorities

FTC Commissioner Julie Brill discussed the agency's competition and consumer protection priorities in her keynote address last Thursday at the ABA's Antitrust Fall Forum at the National Press Club in Washington. Brill led off with an ode to the antitrust ideals of the Progressive Era – with plenty of references to Justice Brandeis – and focused primarily on health care efforts, emphasizing that the FTC and the Affordable Care Act have the same goals of "promoting high quality and cost-effective health care."

Among the recent health care efforts touted by Brill:

• The FTC is committed to ending "pay-for-delay" patent deals among pharmaceutical manufacturers, particularly after the Supreme Court held in FTC v. Actavis in June 2013 that such deals are subject to antitrust scrutiny.