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AHIP, PhRMA Try to Control Narrative as Heat on PBMs Intensifies

 
• By Leslie Small

As health insurance lobby launches advertising campaign to defend ‘evidence-based, market-driven tools,’ drug firms point out the connection between insurers and pharmacy benefit managers.

Pills in dollars
With the spotlight on PBMs, AHIP appears to be trying to prevent spillover. • Source: Shutterstock

The health insurer trade group AHIP recently unveiled a new advertising campaign that accuses the pharmaceutical industry of deflecting blame for its “price-gouging” practices and undermining the “evidence-based, market-driven tools” that health insurers use to keep drug costs in check. But the campaign doesn’t appear to mention PBMs, even though they’re the ones conducting drug-price negotiations with manufacturers on behalf of health plans and employers.

Health care industry observers say that omission is unsurprising since PBMs are currently facing a growing wave of scrutiny — scrutiny that insurers likely want to minimize even if they...

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