Federal Daily - January 26, 2010

Industry Opposition Lines Up Against New FEHBP Drug Bill

A new bill aimed at controlling prescription drug costs for Federal Employees Health Benefits Program beneficiaries has opened up yet another opportunity for a health care skirmish.

The bill, H.R. 4489—introduced Jan. 21 by Rep. Stephen Lynch, D-Mass., chairman of the House Federal Workforce Subcommittee—would change many of the ground rules for FEHBP pharmacy benefit managers, and compel them to reveal more of their operational processes. The legislation also includes language that would prohibit companies that own both retail drugstores and a PBM from doing business with FEHBP carriers. Lynch says the bill will help hold down drug costs.

But the same day the bill was introduced, a group representing pharmacy benefit managers—the Pharmaceutical Care Management Association—quickly drew up battle lines, claiming the bill will drive up—rather than reduce—drug costs for FEHBP members, and decrease beneficiaries’ choices.

PCMA said language in the bill that requires disclosure of sensitive pricing information would give the upper hand to drug-makers and drugstores so they could charge higher prices at the expense of federal employees.

The group also said that the bill wrongly positions PBMs as a driving force behind the increases in prescription drug prices. PCMA claimed the opposite is true.

“PBMs lower drug benefit costs by encouraging the use of generic drug alternatives, negotiating discounts from manufacturers and drug stores, saving money with home delivery and using health information technology like e-prescribing to reduce waste and improve patient safety,” the group said.

To see more, go to: http://tinyurl.com/PBM100125/

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Federal Unions Show Slight Gains Last Year

Despite a national trend of stagnating union membership, federal unions showed small gains last year, according to a Bureau of Labor Statistics report released Jan. 22.

As a percentage of federal employees, union membership actually slid a bit in 2009, to 28.0 percent, compared to 28.1 percent the previous year. But the federal workforce itself grew, and the actual number of federal employee union members inched up from 994,000 in 2008 to about 1 million in 2009.

In addition to gaining members in 2009, federal employee unions also represented more feds in 2009. The total number of feds in jobs covered by union contracts (including both union members and non-member employees) grew from 33.0 percent of feds (1.17 million) in 2008 to 33.2 percent (1.2 million) in 2009. Overall federal employment grew from 3.54 million in 2008 to 3.59 million last year.

The report also noted that more public-sector employees (7.9 million) belonged to a union than did private-sector employees (7.4 million), despite there being five times more wage and salary workers in the private sector. The overall national union membership rate in 2009 was 12.3 percent, down from 12.4 percent in 2008, BLS said. In 2009, union members had median weekly earnings of $908, while those who were not represented by unions earned $710, the report said.

Labor Secretary Hilda L. Solis said the report underlined why Congress should pass the Obama administration's “card check” legislation, which she said would make it easier for workers to schedule unionization elections.

“As workers across the country have seen their real and nominal wages decline as a result of the recession, these numbers show a need for Congress to pass legislation to level the playing field to enable more American workers to access the benefits of union membership,” Solis said. “This report makes clear why the administration supports the Employee Free Choice Act.”

To see more, go to: http://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/union2.pdf (report) or 
www.dol.gov/opa/media/press/opa/opa20100105.htm (Solis).

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