Members of the Virginia General Assembly are trying to get a prescription for savings.
"They affect us all, yet they remain hidden," says Delegate Katrina Callsen, a Democrat from Albemarle County talking about pharmacy benefit managers.
"They negotiate rebates for drugs but don't pass the savings along to us."
That's why she introduced legislation to crack down on the middlemen who manage prescription drug benefits.
"It bans the practice of PBMs requiring patients to use only specific pharmacies," Callsen says. "It requires disclosures of fees and costs to patients. And it mandates pass-through rebates to us."
The effort has widespread bipartisan support, including Republican Delegate Otto Wachsmann, a pharmacist from Sussex County. He says his district is becoming a pharmacy desert.
"I ended up having to sell my pharmacy in 2019 for this very reason. The PBMs that were doing one-sided contracts and take-it-or-leave it contracts," Wachsmann says. "This bill helps to rectify that – to give some say over what happens to give our pharmacies that are remaining a chance of surviving."
The bill received a unanimous vote in the House and in the Senate, so it's likely to be heading to the governor's desk soon.
