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SingleCare Industry News Round-up 8/5: PhRMA, CVS and Healthcare Rationing

Cropped SingleCare logo By | August 5, 2016

Stay up-to-date with another round-up of this week’s news in healthcare! Read about PhRMA’s new campaign to counter claims that pharmaceutical companies are responsible for rising drug costs, CVS’s new plan to replace high-cost drugs, and a look at how the income gap may effect your health coverage.

First, a new campaign from PhRMA will try to counter claims from both Republicans and Democrats that the drug industry is responsible for the rising price of medications.

The drug industry is planning to spend hundreds of millions of dollars post-election in an ad war to fight back at politicians from both parties who have trashed pharmaceutical companies for high prices of prescription drugs, Pro’s Sarah Karlin-Smith reports. […] The PhRMA campaign will primarily highlight benefits of the life-altering treatments its companies produce, and draw attention to more expensive parts of the health care system that drive up patients’ health care costs.

Next, a look at CVS’s plan to replace the expensive drugs used to treat cancer, diabetes and hepatitis C with cheaper options

CVS Health, the giant pharmacy benefits manager, moved Tuesday to counteract the financial impact of high-cost medications by excluding a number of drugs used to treat patients with cancer, diabetes and hepatitis C. […] In some cases, higher-cost drugs are being replaced with lower-cost options, the company said.

Finally, read an editorial that asks if healthcare is being rationed based on income.

All health care systems ration care one way or another. There are good ways and bad ways to do it. Ours is a bad and irrational way. It allows for excess, often inappropriate and ineffective care for those who can pay and exclusion of those who suffer worse outcomes due to lack of access and affordability. […] We have a system of rationing based on ability to pay without regard to medical need. Moreover, we still have no significant containment of prices and costs of health care as well as the worst health care outcomes compared to ten other advanced countries, including Canada.

[Main Image: Ca-ssis/ Thinkstock]

                                    

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