Texas Border Business
WASHINGTON – Today on the floor, U.S. Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) discusses the rising cost of prescription drugs in advance of tomorrow’s hearing in the Senate Finance Committee on the role of Pharmacy Benefit Managers (PBM). Excerpts of Sen. Cornyn’s floor remarks are below, and video can be found here.
“Tomorrow the Senate Finance Committee will continue with hearings on the high cost of prescription drugs. I hear a lot about this back home in Texas.”
“Their stories can be heartbreaking.”
“Over the last few months we have been looking at every step a drug takes en route from research and development to the bottle in your medicine cabinet and asking a lot of questions along the way.”
“We need to peel back like the layers of an onion so we know exactly what’s going on. What I find surprising is that for as big of a role as PBM’s play, we know surprisingly little about how they operate. The terms of these rebates, including dollar amounts and incentives are cloaked in secrecy. Since there’s no paper trail or standard procedure on how these rebates or discounts are determined, it’s nearly impossible to follow the money.”
“This lack of transparency for the consumer is concerning. It should not take an advanced degree to figure out where your money is going when you buy your prescription drugs. So I’m eager to question these prescription benefit managers tomorrow and hope to begin to remove the shroud of secrecy surrounding these rebates and prescription drug pricing. Finding out what has led to these rising prices is critical to ensuring that Americans are able to receive the drugs they need at a price they can afford.”
Senator John Cornyn, a Republican from Texas, is a member of the Senate Finance, Intelligence, and Judiciary Committees.
 discusses the rising cost of prescription drugs in advance of tomorrow’s hearing in the Senate Finance Committee on the role of Pharmacy Benefit Managers (PBM).){kind=link}