On July 11 and 12, the House Ways and Means Committee marked up and passed 11 bills that will expand the use and availability of Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) for all Americans and would make other changes to the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA), or Obamacare. The bills considered were: H.R. 6301, “To […]
Report demonstrates that the 340B drug discount program is out of control and in dire need of restructuring.
The Safety Net 340B drug program must clearly define eligible patients to help them and not fatten hospital coffers.
On March 8, Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW), penned a blog which pointed out a harmful and major change to Medicare Part D that will cost pharmaceutical manufacturers far more than anticipated: $4.1 billion over 10 years, a 53 percent increase from the Congressional Budget Office’s (CBO) original score. Some may think whacking pharmaceutical manufacturers […]
On Friday, May 11, President Trump released his report on what his administration will do to lower drug costs.
As the May 18 deadline for negotiating a modernized North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) looms, negotiators should consider closely how intellectual property (IP) rights will be treated between the countries involved. According to the Global Innovation Policy Center’s (GIPC) 2018 International IP Index, which measures 50 countries against 40 IP indicators, the U.S. ranked […]
The President has already made some good policy decisions and has offered other proposals that will help to lower drug costs.
You may recall a March 5, WasteWatcher blog, “New FDA Report on BPA: It is Still Safe,” which discussed a pre-peer review draft study released by the National Toxicology Program (NTP) on bisphenol A (BPA), a compound used to produce plastic products and epoxy resins used in food and beverage can linings. The study, two-years […]
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare, is bringing many changes in the healthcare space and few are as subtly transformative as the rapid increase in cross-industry consolidation. A record breaking 115 mergers and acquisitions among hospitals and health systems occurred in 2017, an increase of 13 percent from 2016. These mega-deals can […]
On February 15, 2018, 18 Democratic members of Congress sent a letter to Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Alex Azar, asking him to use his authority under 28 U.S.C. §1498 to issue a compulsory license on patents for drugs that treat hepatitis C. In other words, they are demanding that the government steal a […]
