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CVS Health Corp. and Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc. were sued by California customers who accused the drugstore operators of charging co-payments for certain prescription drugs that exceed the cost of medicines.
CVS, the largest U.S. pharmacy chain by number of stores, overbilled consumers who used insurance to pay for some generic drugs and wrongfully hid the fact that the medicines' cash price was cheaper, Megan Schultz said in her lawsuit. Schultz said in one case she paid $166 for a generic drug that would have cost only $92 if she'd known to pay cash.
[...] In her suit, Shultz accused CVS of clawing back her co-pay because the chain was in cahoots with the pharmacy benefit managers who got the extra money. The practice was part of CVS's agreements with benefit managers, such as Express Scripts Holding Co. and CVS Caremark, according to the suit filed Monday in federal court in Rhode Island. CVS is based in that state.
"CVS, motivated by profit, deliberately entered into these contracts, dedicating itself to the secret scheme that kept customers in the dark about the true price'' of drugs they purchased, Schultz's lawyers said in the suit, which is seeking group status.
[...] The lawsuits follow at least 16 other cases around the U.S. targeting drugstore chains' alleged co-pay clawback practices. The clawback occurs when patients hand over co-payments set by a pharmacy benefit manager that exceed the actual cash cost of the drug. The benefit managers pocket the difference, according to the complaints.
Most patients never realize there's a cheaper cash price because of clauses in contracts between pharmacies and benefit managers that bar the drugstore from telling people there's a lower-cost way to pay, according to the complaints.
[...] The cases are Megan Schultz v. CVS Health Corporation, 17-cv-359, U.S. District Court for the District of Rhode Island (Providence); and David Grabstald v. Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc., 17-5789, U.S. District Court, Northern District of Illinois (Chicago).
Source: Bloomberg
Also at The Boston Globe, The Chicago Tribune, The Los Angeles Times, and NBCNews
(Score: 3, Insightful) by kurenai.tsubasa on Saturday August 12 2017, @08:29PM (9 children)
This is an easier problem for the free market to fix unlike an infrastructure problem that indicates a natural monopoly like internet connections.
Healthcare in the US is not a free market, and it hasn't been in a long time, way before the ACA (“Obamacare”). Shopping around between Walgreens, Meijer, CVS, that family-owned pharmacy on the south side of town, just to name a few in my neck of the woods, is a very easy thing to do, or at least it would be in a free market.
The pharmacy I used to be able to use online let me choose between 3–4 different manufacturers for each of my meds. Some were really cheap but didn't see too trustworthy. Others were overpriced for no reason I could discern. In all cases, the total cost was way less than with “insurance.”
But in the end, all things considered, single payer is a viable, proven model. It beats the pants off the “insurance” middleman complex in the US. For emergency care, this is a no-brainer. Perhaps for more routine care, it really is beyond the capabilities of most people to manage. We either need to go free market or single payer. Instead, the US has a system of middlemen that is bleeding us dry, the worst of both worlds and as far as I can tell with none of the good of either.
I've noticed that in the Republican hand-wringing, for what little of it I've paid attention to (they need to shit or get off the pot already), the insurance companies really love the ACA, for all of their crybaby antics when it was implemented.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 12 2017, @08:46PM (8 children)
I've yet to see a country which has single-payer, universal health care revolt against it and try to repeal it.
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by jmorris on Saturday August 12 2017, @09:03PM (6 children)
Because it always comes wrapped up in a soul destroying Socialist welfare state. People become so hopeless under such a system they simply lose hope and commit suicide. Whether it is an overdose, a 9mm to the dome, state assisted suicide or simply ennui to the point the society simply doesn't reproduce and fades away, the end is the same. If they did wake up enough to see what is happening to them it would be time for the State to open up a few camps and "liquidate a few Kulaks." Socialism == Death.
Point to the exception. Ain't one.
(Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 12 2017, @10:27PM
Does this mean if we ever pass single payer, we will no longer have to hear this crap from you?
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Whoever on Saturday August 12 2017, @11:01PM (1 child)
That was a fantastic example of Poe's law in action. I cannot tell if the rant was serious or tongue in cheek.
Do I mod it as Funny, or Troll? It's by jmorris which is usually an indicator that a troll mod is appropriate, but it reads so much like it could be sarcastic, that I am very confused.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Azuma Hazuki on Sunday August 13 2017, @04:03AM
Please trust me on this: J-Mo is as serious as an Ebola outbreak. No one can act that well and that consistently.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 12 2017, @11:27PM (1 child)
Denmark
(Score: 2) by jmorris on Saturday August 12 2017, @11:40PM
Birth rate is 1.69. Dying. Thanks for playing, loser. :)
(Score: 2) by jelizondo on Saturday August 12 2017, @11:34PM
I guess the U.S. has become socialist then since suicide rates [soylentnews.org] among white people have increased steadily since about 2004. (see graph Suicide Rates by Ethnicity on linked article.)
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Saturday August 12 2017, @10:42PM
It works provided the main beneficiaries are the tax payers or very likely tax payers ie belonging to the same cultural and ethnic setup. Such that the actual payers see they have a in-group connection to those that use the system. There always has to be an incentive to contribute, meaning everyone in the in-group gets food and housing. Any extras like caviar, boat, big screen tv etc has to be earned..
A trust capital also has to exist that the system is observed to deliver on promises and that the quality is what is perceived as adequate.