The sweeping reform in the country’s health care system has ushered in new jobs in the biotechnology sector, as companies have started hiring people to run drug-making plants that will produce lower-priced versions of prescription medicines.

Therapeutic Proteins, a Chicago-based company, has announced it will hire at least 40 staff within a month to work in its new facility at Illinois Institute of Technology's University Technology Park, the Chicago Tribune reported.

"We started the company in anticipation of this new niche of generic versions of biotech drugs opening," Thomas Flynn III, Therapeutic Proteins' chief executive, told the news provider.

Flynn said the new health care reform law allows biological drugs to be sold as generics, and his company will cash in on this opportunity by producing raw ingredients for cheaper versions of drugs derived from biotechnology.

Biogenerics are unavailable in the U.S. because they were not part of the Hatch-Waxman law, which allowed production of cheaper generics derived from chemicals. Last month’s approval of the “Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act” cleared the path for the Food and Drug Administration to approve biogeneric drugs.

With this new development, jobs in the healthcare sector will remain robust. The Bureau of Labor Statistics, which tracks more than a dozen healthcare-related jobs, some analysts expect the sector to expand by as much as 22% through 2018.