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I don't believe that there is any research backing this.

Do you have any articles, papers etc from reputable sources to back this up? Or is this just personal speculation?

The claim is largely true for drug development, but not for routine procedures. Those are expensive for unrelated, and largely pathological, reasons.

I would suggest: https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_briefs/RB9412.html or The Great American Drug Deal, by Peter Kolchinsky.