US CMS Announces New Strategy to Lower Medicaid Drug Prices

The US Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has announced a new proposal to help lower prescription drug prices for Medicaid. The rule would establish a survey for drugmakers about drug manufacturing costs and would ensure that Medicaid payments for therapeutics, especially high-price cell and gene therapies, are reasonable via the Medicaid Drug Rebate Program (MDRP).

According to Adam Zamecnik, “The proposal also includes steps to make the MDRP more efficient. This includes giving CMS the power to suspend the National Drug Rebate Agreement of a labeller for less than 30 days in case of late reporting of required drug and price information. Vaccines are excluded from COD, and the proposal outlines a process to define vaccines for the MDRP to make sure manufacturers understand what is considered a vaccine.”

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(Source: Pharmaceutical Technology, May 24^th, 2023)