Don’t Wait For Capitol Hill

In our last blog, we talked about how the need for cheaper prescription drugs is a top-of-mind issue for most Americans. We also talked about how some of the problem can be laid on the PBM "middle men" who aren't acting in companies' best interests.

Interestingly, Congress had a real opportunity to take a big step towards an America with fairly priced, transparent prescription drugs through putting the CREATES Act and FAST Generics Act to a vote with the recent two-year Omnibus spending deliberations.

According to The Hill, The CREATES Act "would promote drug price competition by making it easier for medicines whose patents have expired to be sold as less expensive generic versions."

Modern Healthcare reports that the FAST Generics Act could save around $5.4 billion a year in reduced drug costs by giving "generic drug makers a clear pathway for market entry." Basically, it would stop drugmakers "from blocking generic and biosimilar competitors."

It's been nearly a year since the CREATES Act was introduced, and it was rumored to be part of budget negotiations until the final days of deliberating the two-year Omnibus spending package. While there's no official explanation as to why it dropped, industry watchers point to the hundreds of millions of dollars Big Pharma spends each year to maintain the status quo.

While both sides of Congress and the President have wailed against the out of control prices of pharmaceuticals, strangely, it seems nothing is being done about it. But rather than wait an indeterminate amount of time until Congress decides to come around, there are things that employers can do about the skyrocketing drug prices in the near-term.

At Captiva Benefit Solutions, we'd love to talk with you about how to hack Big Pharma with proven strategies that can stem the tide of rising drug prices through Proactive Pharmacy Management.

Don’t Wait For Capitol Hill is courtesy of: Captiva Benefit Solutions