The cost of medications in the US is obscene. The things I have seen people live with there, the financial burden I have seen people endure to manage not even chronic but passing conditions, the effects it has on business (low level/small-medium enterprise, high level and self employed), the things I have seen people modify to work around it* and so on and so on are things that would be considered bad in third word countries a lot of the time. The reason usually cited for these prices in the US is the lack of a coherent bargaining structure to do it from -- if insurers are lucky to have a few million in given coverage pool and have to bargain from that perspective then the UK (or just about any other place with it at country level**) being able to say 60 odd million people on our books and the main game in town... do it or don't.
*epi pens is a fun one -- some $600 at one point, UK is £8.80 for a prescription, albeit the government gets charged about £45 (about $60 at current rates), and said prescription is likely free for those under age, under income levels and if renewed more than a few times in a year it then becomes free. People with serious allergies then face serious choices about what they can do and where they can go if going to the wrong place can rinse you of $600 (maybe more if more than one is needed or you need to go to the hospital afterwards), and not just "oh damn, can't go to the peanut farm" but going to or going past places most of us would not think twice about, and taking jobs that only carry a low (but not effectively absent) risk.
**some places are noted as having a far more genetically coherent population (Japan, Singapore, and so forth), which can lower costs a bit, not got hard numbers in front of me but I don't imagine most big European countries and the big countries of the English speaking world don't differ and experience similar geographical conditions (extreme cold, extreme heat, dryness, altitude, snow, tropics... all available or made available by cheap holidays and ports).
To that end wanting to address the problem seems like something a politician should be doing.
That said is this likely to fix the problem? Is it likely to fix the problem long term? Is it likely to delay fixing it for real if it is not that effective?
There are also the questions of is this an overstep in terms of use of power? Back when Obamacare was being floated/implemented then many had cries of "muh free market" (because that was working so well before***). Even without that is this executive order lark designed for this sort of scenario? Most times I hear it described these executive orders are there to allow things to happen in very quick time if analysis paralysis will cause a moment to be lost. Setting long term policy by one then being the opposite of that -- the president is perfectly free to introduce and plump for legislation that would achieve the same goal.
***if you can get into it then the US does have a top tier system. Not by much though -- some things maybe have a few percentage points here and there over places with free care.
I was taught, by impartial teachers long ago to respect our three branches of Government. I wasn't taught to only respect a certain party or certain political related beliefs.
Is respect not one of those things that is supposed to be earned rather than given blindly, and that is before we do the respect as in authority and respect as in think positively of thing.