In the News

Even as the federal government on Thursday touted the billions of dollars in savings seniors can expect to see from newly negotiated, lower drug costs, pharmacies that supply long-term care facilities are warning of dire consequences.

Many of the nation’s long-term care pharmacies are going to fall below “break-even” and may be forced out of business without additional support when drug-pricing policy changes kick in, sector advocates warned Wednesday.

President Biden in his State of the Union address last week vowed to end “Big Pharma’s” grip on prescription drug pricing and cut costs for seniors and taxpayers by another $200 million.
But the president’s plans to expand his administration’s first-ever Medicare drug price negotiations could spell big trouble for the pharmacists who support seniors living in long-term care settings, advocates warned in response.

In the State of the Union Address on March 7th, President Joseph Biden announced a proposal to expand the number of drugs targeted for annual price negotiations by Medicare and lower prescription drug costs for American families.

Alan Rosenbloom, President & CEO of Senior Care Pharmacy Coalition, speaks with the AmplifyLTC Pharmacy Podcast and discusses all about the current efforts to make PBM reform a reality. In this episode, learn about the ins and outs of PBM reform, what it means for LTC pharmacy, and what your LTC pharmacy should be doing.

If there’s one thing most Americans still agree on, it’s that the ever-increasing cost of healthcare is simply unsustainable. And while there is plenty of blame to go around, one must look at who benefits behind the scenes from inflated prices — particularly for prescription medications — to really understand the root of the problem.

Any lower drug prices that result from White House efforts to negotiate on behalf of Medicare beneficiaries may lead to short-term gains for nursing homes, but there also could be a steep price to pay in the long-term, experts warned this week. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services on Tuesday announced the first 10 drugs covered by Medicare Part D that will be included in negotiations running through 2024. They are all commonly prescribed drugs that treat conditions ranging from diabetes to arthritis and heart failure.

Following the Biden Administration’s bid this week to reduce the price of certain drugs – many of which are commonly used in nursing homes – experts are cautioning that the changes may negatively impact the bottomline of organizations in the sector. As Medicare Part D price negotiations for these drugs come into focus this week, the Senior Care Pharmacy Coalition (SCPC), for one, is warning that changes to Part D might cause “collateral damage” to long-term care pharmacies, the patients they serve and operator partners.

Long-term care pharmacies say the kick-off of Medicare drug price negotiation Tuesday (Aug. 29), while well-intentioned, will inadvertently hurt them and their patients unless policy makers also move forward on pharmacy benefit manager and Part D payment reforms. “Long term care pharmacies are likely to be collateral damage,” Alan Rosenbloom, president and CEO of the Senior Care Pharmacy Coalition, told Inside Health Policy.