Share Copy link Email LinkedIn X/Twitter Facebook Print Pharmacy benefit managers want to make sure that an Illinois law creating drug pricing transparency and reforming health benefits administration doesn’t apply to them. On Tuesday, powerful PBM lobby the Pharmaceutical Care Management Association filed a complaint in federal court against the Illinois Department of Insurance, arguing that the Prescription Drug Affordability Act signed into law last summer clashes with federal oversight of employee benefit plans and that PBMs should be carved out from its provisions. It’s been a busy week for PCMA lawyers. On Monday, the lobby sued Tennessee’s insurance department to block a PBM reform law in that state. The PCMA is alleging that the PDAA will cause substantial harm to the association’s members, which include the so-called “Big Three” PBMs — Express Scripts, Carema…

pharmaceutical supply chain and control the flow of drugs between pharmaceutical companies, insurers, pharmacies and patients. J.B Pritzker signed the law in July, part of a larger wave of state legislatures across the country passing PBM reform legislation to the annoyance of market giants in the industry. The PCMA is particularly rankled about two provisions of the PDAA. First, the law requires PBMs to submit annual reports to the Illinois Department of Insurers and its payer customers that include granular data on its drug pricing and dispensing practices. For example, PBMs will have to share — for a single transaction — how much the plan paid the PBM, how much the PBM paid the pharmacy and the size of any rebate the PBM received from the drugmaker.