Posted by Michael Wonder on 10 Apr 2019
CVS, Cigna, Humana blame big pharma at Senate hearing for skyrocketing US drug prices
9 April 2019 - In written testimony submitted to the Senate Finance Committee, they blasted the drug industry for the rising cost of brand-name drugs.
Executives from the nation’s largest pharmacy benefit managers denied on Tuesday that the industry’s so-called backdoor deals with drugmakers are responsible for the increasingly higher prices patients pay for medication, pointing the finger at Big Pharma instead.
The companies — CVS Health, Cigna, Prime Therapeutics, Humana and UnitedHealthcare’s OptumRx — said rebates paid by drug companies to PBMs, sometimes called “middlemen,” are not secret payments as some lawmakers in Congress insist, according to written testimony submitted for a Senate Finance Committee hearing. CVS said rebates are actually “a powerful tool used to offset” the high list prices set by pharmaceutical companies.
