Posted by Michael Wonder on 04 May 2019
Trump drug rebate plan won't see lower list prices, CBO says
3 May 2019 - Plan would raise federal spending by $177 billion, agency says.
A key part of the Trump administration’s plan to lower the list prices of drugs wouldn’t actually do so and would end up increasing federal spending by tens of billions of dollars over a decade, the Congressional Budget Office said Thursday.
A proposal put forth by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in January would sharply curtail a complex system of drug-price rebates that pharmaceutical companies pay to pharmacy-benefit managers, or PBMs. The rebates give drugmakers’ products favourable placement on list of drugs covered by health-insurance plans. Those lists can steer patients to one product over another, using co-pays or cost sharing to make preferred products cheaper.
