Call for Transparency in 340B: Protect Patients from Rising Drug Costs and Corporate Abuse!
- por: AIR340B
The 340B Drug Pricing Program was intended to help expand access to discounted medicines for vulnerable patients. Instead, big hospitals, chain pharmacies and pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) are capturing billions of dollars in profits off the program while patients are left behind with climbing drug costs.
Weak oversight and a lack of accountability in 340B is allowing large corporations, including CVS and Walmart, to boost their margins at the expense of the vulnerable patients the program was intended to help.
It is encouraging to see action being taken at the federal level with the recent introduction of the 340B ACCESS Act (H.R. 8574), but even more must be done to address the significant abuses of the program.
Congress needs to act now to rid the 340B program of this abuse, ensuring discounts on medicines are going to low-income patients.
Join us today and send a letter to your member of Congress urging them to demand transparency and accountability in the 340B program — not policies that are giveaways for PBMs, chain pharmacies and hospitals.
Dear [Insert legislator],
I am writing to bring attention to abuses surrounding the 340B Drug Pricing Program and ask for your help in protecting vulnerable patients who deserve to benefit from the program. It is with our shared community in mind that I urge you to support measures that promote accountability and transparency in the 340B program — not policies that are giveaways to PBMs, chain pharmacies and hospitals.
The federal 340B program was designed to help expand access to discounted medicines for low-income, uninsured and otherwise vulnerable patients. However, large nonprofit hospitals are using 340B to buy medicines at a 60% discount but charge higher prices for both uninsured and insured patients. And they are using hundreds of thousands of chain pharmacies to expand their use of the program and increase their profits. The nation's three largest PBMs – CVS Health, Express Scripts and OptumRx – along with Walgreens and Walmart control more than 75% of the pharmacy contracts with 340B providers. Weak oversight of the program is allowing these large corporations to use the 340B program as a profit driver.
Moreover, the 340B program is not helping the very patients it was meant to serve. Two-thirds of 340B disproportionate share hospitals are not located in medically underserved areas, and as the program has expanded, growth of contract pharmacies has concentrated in affluent neighborhoods while the share of 340B pharmacies in socioeconomically disadvantaged neighborhoods has declined. Charity care levels at 340B hospitals are also on a downward trend. In fact, 340B profit exceeds charity care spending for 85% of disproportionate share hospitals participating in the program.
Congress meant for 340B to expand access to treatments for vulnerable, low-income patients and not to boost corporate profit margins.
It is encouraging to see action being taken at the federal level with the recent introduction of the 340B ACCESS Act (H.R. 8574), but even more must be done to address the significant abuses of the program.
I urge you to support improvements to the 340B program and ensure that large hospitals, PBMs and chain pharmacies are not empowered to continue abusing it at the expense of vulnerable patients and communities in need.
Thank you for your leadership to protect patients and your attention to this critical issue.
Sincerely,
[Signatory Name]
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