PBM Accountability Project Statement on Administration’s April 15 Executive Order

The White House issued an executive order (EO) on April 15 aimed at “Lowering Drug Prices by Once Again Putting Americans First.” The EO directs the Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy, in coordination with the Secretary of Health and Human Services, the OMB Director and the Assistant to the President for Economic Policy to “reevaluate the role of middlemen” and directs the Secretary of Labor to propose regulations to “improve employer health plan fiduciary transparency into the direct and indirect compensation received by pharmacy benefit managers.”

Mark Blum, managing director of the PBM Accountability Project, issued the following statement:

“We are pleased to see that President Trump’s executive order recognizes the need to address the harmful practices of PBM middlemen on the American people and employers.

“As we have said before, the predatory and anti-competitive practices of PBMs must be reformed to help lower drug costs for Americans. The largest middlemen PBMs control more than 85% of the prescription drug market and are incentivized to raise the out-of-pocket costs for patients, taxpayers and employers. We must demand greater transparency from PBMs on how they generate the exorbitant revenues that make them some of the most profitable corporations in the world, all while patients are paying increasingly high out-of-pocket costs for the treatments they need.

“The time is now to finally break the connection between PBM compensation and the price of medicine and to expose the hidden PBM profit schemes that drive up healthcare costs.

“The most direct way to achieve the administration’s goals is for Congress to enact, and the President to sign, already agreed upon PBM reforms to fix our broken drug pricing system to give patients and consumers access to more affordable medicines.”

To learn more about the PBM issue and legislative solutions, click here.