PCMA represents several American managed care entities and has been an active participant in the national debate over the issue of high priced biotech Rx drugs.
As the controversy over Sovaldi’s $84,000 per therapy cost continues to build, the Pharmaceutical Care Management Association has released a study on the impact of the new Hepatitis C drugs on the overall costs to the US Medicare Part D pharmaceutical program (http://www.pcmanet.org/images/stories/uploads/2014/partdpremiumstudymilliman.pdf)
PCMA represents several American managed care entities and has been an active participant in the national debate over the issue of high priced biotech Rx drugs. Several of the PCMA’s members, including CVS Caremark, have publicly objected to the pricing of Sovaldi by the drug’s manufacturer, Gilead (http://goo.gl/vgFtvR ). Gilead, interestingly, is listed as a PCMA affiliate on the PCMA website (http://goo.gl/TwdtzY ).
It should be noted that the study was created for the PCMA by the respected actuarial service, Milliman.
Highlights:
The actuarial firm noted that their analysis was based on a representative 2015 Prescription Drug Plan (PDP) bid that was developed by using a comprehensive Medicare Care Part D database that utilized a defined standard benefit design.
Milliman emphasized that while the actual bids of the PDPs will vary based on populations and several other demographic variables, the firm used an estimate that models that entire Medicare population which enabled Milliman to generate Part D 2015 estimates with - and without - the new HCV product coverage.
A few other points that Milliman offers to readers of this report:
Milliman underscores that the report is limited only to the cost of the new HCV drugs and stresses that these cost impacts do not address the potential savings that these new PCV drugs may drive. The potential, overall savings that may result from the Sovaldi therapy is a major issue that Gilead, manufacturer of Sovaldi, has emphasized repeatedly in the public media (http://goo.gl/XH5w37 ).
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