“It’s an initial phase of what we hope the federal government will be helping with in terms of various strategies to control drug costs. The transparency piece around high-cost drugs is important,” Ms. McEvoy said. “Continuing to support states and getting the highest level of rebates for those drugs is also very important.”
In a proposed rule published May 23, CMS laid out plans to increase transparency by requiring manufacturers to disclose some pricing information through a price survey and requiring PBMs to disclose more pricing details to managed care plans.
In a fact sheet, CMS said the proposed changes could help promote value-based contracting agreements for drugs.
Ms. McEvoy said value-based options can help state Medicaid programs control costs.
“The bottom line is, Medicaid is required to cover all FDA-approved drugs,” Ms. McEvoy said. “That can be challenging for programs in terms of using all those levers to control costs.”
