Old Dominion News

WASHINGTON, D.C. –On May 12, 2023, U.S. Senator Tim Kaine—a member of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee—applauded the HELP Committee’s passage of the bipartisan Pharmacy Benefit Manager Reform Act, legislation that would help lower drug costs for Virginians and Americans across the country.

The Pharmacy Benefit Manager Reform Act included the Patient Right to Shop Act, bipartisan legislation led by Kaine and U.S. Senators Roger Marshall (R-KS), Edward J. Markey (D-MA), and Chuck Grassley (R-IA) to prohibit gag clauses in Pharmacy Benefit Manager contracts to ensure patients can access pricing tools to compare prices before paying for a prescription.

“I often hear from Virginians about how America’s health care system should be less complicated and more affordable—and I agree,” said Kaine. “One crucial way to lower costs is to make drug prices more transparent so consumers can make informed decisions. I’m glad the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee passed our bipartisan legislation to allow Virginians to compare prices when they’re deciding where to pick up their prescriptions. I’m going to keep working to get this bill across the finish line, and to fight for other legislation to make health care more accessible and affordable.”

Last year, Kaine was proud to help pass the Inflation Reduction Act, which allowed Medicare to negotiate drug prices for seniors and people with disabilities and established a $2,000 cap on out-of-pocket costs for prescription drugs for seniors covered under Medicare Part D. The Inflation Reduction Act also provided free coverage of vaccines under Part D and benefitted 11,000 low-income Virginians by expanding the Low-Income Subsidy program.

Kaine has also long authored and advocated for additional legislation that would bring more transparency to the health care system and lower drug costs, including by strengthening the pipeline and increase transparency for critical medicines and more efficiently ushering drugs to the market by making key improvements to the Food and Drug Administration’s review process for interchangeable biosimilars.

Original source can be found here.