Maine Passes Drug Transparency Law – A Study

We try to keep our readers in the loop with transparency and other related legislation that are happening throughout the country. On May 1, 2018, the governor of Maine, Paul LePage, allowed legislation to pass into law without his signature that: (1) authorizes a study to review and overview drug prices and (2) has implications for top 25 drugs of different types. As noted in our previous article on the legislation, the Maine Data Health Data Organization now will be required to provide a report containing the following information about brand name and generic drugs by December 1, 2018, and annually thereafter: the 25 most frequently prescribed drugs in Maine; the 25 costliest drugs as determined by the total amount spent on those drugs in the state; and the 25 drugs with the highest year-over-year cost increases as determined by the total amount spent on those drugs by the state. This is a striped down version from the original proposal that would have required manufacturers of the drugs identified to report pricing information. The Report One interesting piece of the legislation that we have not previously noted is that the legislature, and Governor LePage by allowing the bill to go into law, are paying the Maine Health Data Organization $25,000.00 for an initial investment of the report and plan. As outlined in the legislation, the Maine Health Data Organization (MHDO) will be responsible for developing a plan to collect data from manufacturers related to the cost and...
Source: Policy and Medicine - Category: American Health Authors: Source Type: blogs