Not long ago, Gov. Andy Beshear swiftly signed the expensive Kentucky Senate Bill 188 into law. Never mind that in passing SB188, lawmakers in Frankfort completely ignored statutory requirements that any bill that will increase health care costs must first have a health mandate statement before it can move out of committee or off the floor. More troubling is that those same lawmakers completely ignored the concerns of stakeholders in passing a comprehensive bill that will drive up health care costs in our state by hundreds of millions of dollars annually.
SB 188 targets Pharmacy Benefit Managers, who manage prescription drug benefits for health insurers, large employers and other payers. The bill’s troublesome provisions include a new mandated dispensing fee of $10 charged by pharmacies for each prescription filled. It also restricts the use of mail-order pharmacies, which have been shown to not only reduce costs, but increase access, while promoting adherence.. Anti-consumer legislation like this does nothing to actually address rising drug prices — in fact, we’ll soon see that it does the exact opposite.