Driving home (the message.) Yesterday President Biden drove up to the National Institutes of Health and gave a speech about drug prices. My main issue with it is the traffic caused by shutting down the beltway and all the roads around my neighborhood. Okay and I think that a lot of the inflation penalties for Part B are a lot of squeeze and little juice ($1 saved per month!!!). What caught my eye are the comments on the White House tweet about the event. Granted there are probably a lot of bots posting but also just a lot of people who truly don’t understand any of this and still feel the need to post. I know – Duh – but just another reminder of how hard it is to get the message about anything out.

Annual reminder that we spend a lot on health. National Health Expenditures came out. Health care spending in the United States increased 4.1 percent to $4.5 trillion, or $13,493 per person. That’s a lot of moo-la.

Provider knows best. Mark Fendrick writes in Health Affairs about the need to incorporate clinician input into the IRA negotiation process to avoid access barriers. Just because a drug is negotiated doesn’t make it the best drug for patients – access in Part D is an ongoing issue.

Seeing clearly overrated? The House of Representatives passed Lower Costs, More Transparency Act. And I’m still feeling meh about it. I just don’t believe that more transparency = lower costs. Sometimes there is a causation but not always. In the mix was hospital and pharmacy benefit manager pieces. Senate is unlikely to move forward so we’re kind of waiting this out for a while.

Could have, would have. Mathematica put out a report looking at what might have happened if the Medicare drug discount program was in effect in 2021. What’s interesting is that the total Part D spend of those drugs is less than $21 billion and as low as $1.3 billion for some on the list. I

Give it a listen: NPR feature on PBMs. Everything you wanted to know while you run holiday errands. If you’re more of a skim, the transcript is in the link too.