By Lisa Quarterman
CEO and Managing Partner
VativoRx
While Washington promotes old models to lower prescription drug costs, the PBM industry is working to identify effective paths to actual consumer savings.
As a pharmacy benefit management company, VativoRx is keenly aware of the need to simplify access to prescription drugs and to make them more affordable for everyone.
And, while it’s good to see the president and Congress focusing on an issue that’s so important to all Americans, it’s unfortunate that such an opportunity to make real progress relies on doubling down on federal practices that might actually inadvertently drive up costs.
That’s why we agree with the Pharmaceutical Care Management Association (PCMA), PCMA recently noted in response to new federal programs in the president’s currently stalled Building Back Better package of legislation targeted at healthcare costs that, while well-meaning, these proposals would actually cost healthcare consumers more.
This makes no sense to us, especially considering that there are already commonsense ideas on the table from PMCA:
“Adopting common-sense policies from PCMA’s the Critical Path Forward: Rx Policies to Reduce Patient Costs, Improve Access that end the anticompetitive practices of pharmaceutical manufacturers and enhance competition in the marketplace could achieve federal savings of $59.1 billion to $118.3 billion over 10 years.”
What’s involved in these proposals, dubbed The Critical Path Forward? Among them are:
- Hold pharmaceutical manufacturers accountable for high prices on new and existing drugs
- Promote generic and bio similar competition
- Eliminate tax-deductibility of the drug advertising that you see everywhere
You can read the full report here. If you are in the business of making prescription drugs affordable to the most people possible, I recommend taking a closer look. It’s totally eye-opening.
VativoRx is committed to helping control the cost of prescription drugs by working with each individual client to identify opportunities for savings and by finding innovative ways to manage costs for both the client and the consumer. The positions of the PCMA are evidence of what we’ve been saying: PBMs can do better.
