Health Care Inc: Prior authorization reform for prescription drugs

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FTC v. the Big 3

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The animosity between the Federal Trade Commission and pharmacy benefit managers has reached a boiling point. The FTC sued the nation’s three biggest PBMs last week, accusing them and their secretive group purchasing organizations of creating a “perverse” system of rebates that specifically has driven up the price of insulin, my colleague Ed Silverman reports.

CVS Caremark, Cigna’s Express Scripts, and UnitedHealth Group’s Optum Rx condemned the lawsuit. They pointed to insulin manufacturers as the culprits. For what it’s worth, Rahul Rao, deputy director of the FTC’s Bureau of Competition, said in a statement the largest insulin makers “should be on notice that their participation in the type of conduct challenged here can raise serious concerns.”