Trump Announces Two Rules Aimed at Lowering Drug Prices

President Trump on Friday announced two major actions aimed at reducing the cost of prescription drugs. One action, the ‘Favored Nations’ rule, would lower drug prices in the US by tying them to those of other developed nations. Specifically, the measure would limit the amount Medicare pays for a drug to that of the lowest price paid among wealthy foreign governments.

The second action would eliminate the rebates that drugmakers pay to “middlemen” known as pharmacy benefit managers, in a bid to simplify the drug pricing system and pass the discounts on to consumers instead. “While pharma manufacturers would have you believe rebates are a problem and have pushed the administration’s ‘rebate rule,’ time and time again, economists and analysts have found that the rule takes us in the wrong direction by increasing costs and premiums,” Matt Eyles, president and CEO of America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP), said in a statement. Read more here.

(Source: Joyce Friedan; Medpage Today; 11/20/20)