Health Minister Mark Butler is planning to speed up medicine approvals as US President Donald Trump threatens to put tariffs of up to 250 per cent on pharmaceutical products, which could affect $2 billion worth of Australian exports.

Butler said Trump’s latest threat would not change the discount Australians received on medicines through the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, but revealed he would get advice within days about accelerating the approvals process for new drugs in Australia – a key issue that US pharmaceutical giants have raised with Trump.

Speeding up the timeframe for US medicines to land on pharmacy shelves could improve the Australian government’s standing with the Trump administration, although it does not deal with the White House’s bigger concern that Americans pay more for medicines than citizens of other countries.

Trump’s anger with what he called “foreign freeloading nations” prompted him to threaten tariffs of up to 250 per cent on drug imports this week.

Butler said it was a “a very big threat”. “It’s one we’re working very hard to engage with the Americans on,” he said on Thursday.

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“The numbers are jumping around … They were 200 per cent a couple of weeks ago, and now they’re 250 per cent potentially. They are very, very big tariffs.

“We are making the case very strongly, but I’m not going to pretend that the US administration doesn’t appear to be pretty serious about this.”

Australia’s PBS – under which the government subsidises drugs and Australians can buy expensive medicines for a maximum price of $31.60, soon to become $25 – has been brought up repeatedly during Trump’s trade wars as US pharmaceutical companies push the president to punish countries that limit their market access.