WASHINGTON — The much-maligned pharmacy middlemen escaped largely unscathed during a high-profile congressional hearing Tuesday — but the powerful bipartisan duo behind the hearing now appears intent on legislating, and it looks like increasing transparency will be their primary goal.
Executives for the country’s five largest pharmacy benefit managers, the middlemen that negotiate with drug makers over the price of their drugs, were expected to face hard questions about their role in the ever rising price of prescription drugs from members of the Senate Finance Committee. But the PBM executives largely parried the senators’ questions, none of which shone too harsh a spotlight on the industry’s practices.
Both the committee’s Republican chairman, Chuck Grassley (Iowa), and his Democratic counterpart, ranking member Ron Wyden (Ore.), have long criticized the role of PBMs, and appear intent on passing some form of PBM legislation this Congress.
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