According to this article in FORBES … the brand name industry is basically giving away the farm in rebates.. This might help to explain why before there were “drug cards” and PBM’s… wholesale prices didn’t move much… Almost everyday I work.. I see insurance “formularies” mandating the using of one drug over another for a particular patient… We at the pharmacy level have to spend so much time/energy making sure that the insurance company maximizes its profits. Have you also noticed that MAC’s are not applied to brand name drugs.. guess that the price goes up 10% to and half or more of the price increase goes to the insurance company.. I guess that it also explains why the average Rx price from the 60’s – before PBM’s – was 5.00 and using the CPI.. today they would have been in the $25 – $35 range… instead of twice that… I guess it is not hard to figure out where that other 50% is going !
Filed under: General dumb-ass problems
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