🚨EXPOSED🚨
$CVS manager admits: “I don’t give a f*ck about this G-D job”.
PBMs determine WHICH drugs we can access, WHERE & their COST. Imagine being a patient forced to obtain critical medications only from this pharmacy.🧵1/
(Warning: video contains offensive language.)
For patients, the video's less-than-professional pharmacy environment simply reflects a final indignity faced when acquiring prescription drugs & vaccinations. There's often not the consumer freedom to go elsewhere. This MUST change as vertical corp integration rises. 2/
Corporations like CVS Health have a fiduciary responsibility to shareholders, not to patients. They can per federal regulatory blessing steer patients to patronize other businesses they own & to formulary drugs w/ the highest profit margin they get kickbacks on from pharma. /3
Example: These premium paying patients are presented with the 'choice' by their middleman PBM to either pay FULL PRICE for drugs at their current pharmacy or get their medications at lower cost with a pharmacy the PBM parent-corporation also owns. Not really a 'choice' is it? 4/
CVS Health closed a $10 billion deal for Oak Street Health & plans to open 50 senior clinics within CVS pharmacies in 2024. Will Medicare Advantage patients now be similarly steered w/ the 'choice' to receive their health care at pharmacy environments as seen in the video? 5/
I know well how we are failing vulnerable citizens absent strong consumer protections. I & 150,000 stable heart patients were non-medically forced by CVS Health off our long-time anticoagulant despite 16 nonprofits calling it dangerous. Harms occurred.6/ onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/rt…
I've offered my testimony to Congress, yet so far only PBM execs have spoken there; no patients. I 'have the receipts' from the Eliquis PBM formulary fiasco. Our experience needs to be heard & strong patient protections enacted to prevent future PBM harms from happening. 7/
Public health now relies upon for-profit corporations for immunizations, medications & increasingly primary care. Just 3 corporations control 80%+ of drug access. Why is this monopolized sector allowed to party off patient profits without greater consumer protections in place? 8/
We’re told our expectations are too high:
👉Too high to expect to affordably get the drug our doctor prescribes?
👉Too high to expect stability on our existing treatments?
👉Too high to be able to go to a pharmacy of our choice?
Common sense consumer protections needed.9/
It is time for action to protect patients. I call upon every candidate this year to take a position: Where do you stand on this issue of prescription drug consumer freedom? 10/
@realDonaldTrump @NikkiHaley @RonDeSantis @RobertKennedyJr @JoeBiden @VivekGRamaswamy @AsaHutchinson
Calling upon Congress, @WhiteHouse & @FTC for not just continued talk, but concrete ACTION to protect patients. Thank you. 11/ @GOPHELP @HELPCmteDems @GOPoversight @BernieSanders @SenBillCassidy @RepMarkPocan @linakhanFTC @BedoyaFTC @POTUS @RepKatiePorter @RonWyden @MikeCrapo
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Congress is failing to address PBM reform without ever calling patients to testify.
The PBM execs have spoken.
The pharma execs have spoken.
Since apparently the only public platform patients have is social media, let me give an example how patients are being harmed.
🧵1/
Patients are caught between PBMs & pharma. Let's use as example a drug class so effective & popular they are the #1 (Eliquis) & #3 (Xarelto) federal drug expenditures. Even @JoeBiden & multiple members of Congress take them: anticoagulants aka 'blood thinners'. 2/
Here's my last receipt for Eliquis.
Retail price = $ 713.33
Per recent Senate testimony, cost of production (1 month supply) = $ 1.50
Lifesaving. Used to treat/prevent blood clots such as DVT/PE & stroke caused by afib. Yet affordable only w/ good insurance coverage. 3/
1 in 4 people die from clot related conditions. Anticoagulants treat/prevent. Yet insurer PBMs routinely put up barriers to these effective, life-saving drugs. Adverse events result. 🧵@linakhanFTC @BedoyaFTC @HELPCmteDems @GOPHELP @RebeccaDRobbins
Anticoagulants MUST be added to @HHSGov @CMSGov protected drug class! Given their importance to prevent clot & inherit risks in this medication class, namely bleeding, this MUST be done ASAP @BrooksLaSureCMS to protect patients. PBMs are unqualified to manage anticoagulation.
Additionally, these dangerous PBM tactics used to reduce patient access to effective clot preventing anticoagulants are well known & documented, but despite pleas we are still waiting for basic patient protections. Time for HHS, FTC & Congress to act! onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/rt…
New GAO report on drug rebates leaves no doubt that PBM formulary placement & utilization management decisions are NOT influenced by efficacy, safety, or medical need---as we've been told. Rather $$$ gao.gov/products/gao-2…
"All plan sponsors and drug manufacturers had rebate agreements where manufacturers offered rebates for their drug based on the condition that competitor drugs be subject to restrictions in order to limit their utilization." Wow, think about how that motivates PBM decisions.
The #1 drug for adverse events, anticoagulant class= 17% rebates, 10% expenditures, 3% utilization. Are we really OK with a risky drug class's selection & management being determined not by clinical judgement alone but by non-transparent corporate financial considerations?
.@SenTedBuddNC In today's @GOPHELP you asked PBMs about their rationale for how how formulary placement impacts patients ability to fill prescriptions from their doctors. You were told it was based on clinical evaluation. This is not true. I have the evidence to prove it.
I & 150,000 stable heart patients at risk for stroke & clot were forced off our long time medication by the largest PBM against our doctors wishes. 17 nonprofits said it was dangerous, largest cardiology nonprofit drafting clinical care guidelines met multiple times w/ the PBM.
It was only after 6 months of increasing news stories & social media of adverse events (strokes & bleeds) began getting shared more widely (some among your constituents in NC) that the PBM finally reversed their decision & added the drug back to national formulary.
🚨🚨🚨 EXCLUSIVE AUDIO of senior CVS Caremark executives disparaging patients as "brand terrorists" who Tweet about poor PBM service accessing medications or score them low on satisfaction surveys.🧵1/
Audio is from a PBM Operations town hall event. Topic is a shift in methodology with the “Net Promotor Score” (NPS) which will allow CVS Caremark to minimize “detractors” to skew data towards being able to report more positive consumer satisfaction survey results. 2/
Survey design matters. $CVS Medicare Advantage product recently received a SIGNIFICANTLY LOWER govt rating driven by poor consumer survey results. CVS refuted the govt survey(by @CMSGov@AHRQNews) in SEC filing saying CVS's own internal surveys show higher + results. 3/
The private John Legend concert CVS Health hosted (despite restrictive formularies, non-medical switching & denying patients medication access due to cost) was just the icing on the cake CVS leaders enjoyed this week in Orlando. Let's take a peek at good times on patient dime...
Disney Epcot. LOTS of Disney photos floating around social. Reddit says some CVS 'leadership experience' attendees were given spending money for Epcot because it was a 'team building exercise'. 🤔
Conga!!!! What's a Florida corporate retreat with a conga line?