In case you missed it, recent media reports have attempted to paint a false picture about pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs). These reports fail to mention the value PBMs provide to employers, labor unions, and patients. A recent Boston Herald op-ed from Robert Rizzi, President of the Norfolk County Central Labor Council, Vice President of the Massachusetts AFL-CIO, and a former trustee of the Massachusetts Bricklayers and Masons Health & Welfare Fund, makes it clear that PBMs secure unions or union benefit funds that cover health insurance for their members or for retired workers, significant savings:
“But the facts are clear. PBM practices deliver savings, rather than increase drug costs. PBMs also offer services such as home delivery that lower drug costs. The fact is that I, and many of my union brothers and sisters, receive medications paid for by my union health care from a PBM operated mail order pharmacy. PBMs created home delivery for medications and not only is a more convenient way to access drugs, it’s also much LESS expensive than it would otherwise be because of the contracts that my union plan’s administrators negotiate with these providers.”
Rizzi also highlights who sets the price of prescriptions, and how undermining PBMs would benefit big drug companies:
“When considering how to lower drug costs, it is essential to remember who sets the price: Big Pharma. Drug manufacturers are attempting to distract from their sole discretion to set and raise prescription drug prices by blaming PBMs. Indeed, in pursuit of greater profits for themselves, and to redirect attention to others, Big Pharma invented a new boogeyman: PBMs – and perpetuated myths that other special interests now repeat.”
Big Pharma continues to push these fallacies about PBMs to boost their profits and keep drug prices high, the op-ed goes on to say that:
“If we want to get serious about the expense of prescription drugs, we need to focus on drug manufacturers and the games they play to pad their pockets: price gouging, consistently raising drug prices, failed lawsuits, and patent abuse.”
PBMs save health plan sponsors, like employers and unions, $124 billion per year on prescription drug costs. False narratives and incomplete reporting that ignore the true value and role of PBMs in the prescription drug supply chain serve to support Big Pharma’s blame game designed to keep prescription drug prices high and advance policies to increase drug company profits at the expense of everyone else.
In addition to labor unions speaking out against misguided policies targeting PBMs and highlighting the savings PBMs secure, employers are also sounding the alarm. The Pharmaceutical Care Management Association’s (PCMA) recently launched a new campaign, How PBMs Work, to elevate the voice of employers in the prescription drug conversation — and highlight the important relationship between health plan sponsors and PBMs. Watch employers tell their story, including one employer who uses rebate savings to provide more comprehensive benefits to his more than 600 employers and another who voluntarily chooses spread pricing for his small business because of the predictability it allows him to plan around, HERE.
Read the full Boston Herald op-ed HERE.
Visit our new website and learn more about how PBMs work for employers and patients HERE.
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PCMA is the national association representing America’s pharmacy benefit companies. Pharmacy benefit companies are working every day to secure savings, enable better health outcomes, and support access to quality prescription drug coverage for more than 275 million patients.
