Biotech stocks tumble after Clinton blasts drug ‘price gouging’

A tweet by Hillary Clinton lamenting “price gouging” in the prescription drug market sent some biotech stocks tumbling on Monday.

Clinton said Monday morning that she would be laying out a policy proposal to overhaul “outrageous” pricing among prescription drugs.

{mosads}Shortly after she aired that complaint, major biotechnology investment vehicles took a fairly large dive. The NASDAQ Biotechnology Index fell steadily ever since Clinton made the comment, and was down more than 4.5 percent a few hours later.

Her comment was linked to a New York Times story detailing how an infection-fighting drug, Daraprim, jumped from $13.50 a pill to $750 a tablet overnight, after it was acquired by a new company.

“Price gouging like this in the specialty drug market is outrageous. Tomorrow I’ll lay out a plan to take it on,” Clinton tweeted.

On Sunday, Clinton said she would be rolling out a new plan aimed at controlling prescription drug prices. On CBS’s “Face the Nation,” Clinton said she was constantly hearing gripes about drug costs while on the campaign trail.

“I’m going to address them this week, starting with how we’re going to try to control the cost of skyrocketing prescription drugs,” she said. “It’s something I hear about everywhere I go.”