Michigan’s first tele-pharmacy is open and planning their grand opening celebration for the end of September. Wrigley’s Pharmacy has been operating since January after a bill passed last year making tele-pharmacies legal in Michigan. “It was definitely a long process and I think there was a huge sigh of relief not just from us, but from the community that we’re finally open,” said Tisha Peterson, manager of Wrigley’s Pharmacy. Tele-pharmacies can help people in rural areas get their prescriptions easier. A pharmacist is able to provide care remotely through an audio-video link. “We’re a full service pharmacy. So, we’re able to offer consultations, medication management. The pharmacist is able to review profiles and be able to go over and ensure [...]

The Inflation Reduction Act contains provisions that are expected to lower drug costs for millions of Americans by allowing Medicare to negotiate some drug prices and by limiting the amount of out-of-pocket drug costs for Medicare Part D patients. John Clark John Clark, clinical associate professor at the University of Michigan College of Pharmacy and associate chief pharmacy officer at Michigan Medicine, explains what this means to consumers. What are the major components of this new drug pricing package? The drug cost pricing package allows for Medicare to negotiate pricing for certain prescription medications. The number of medications is phased in and starts with 10 medications in 2026. Starting in 2023, drug companies must pay rebates if drug prices rise faster than [...]

The Biden administration's fall push for coronavirus boosters will get underway in September, weeks earlier than initially planned, the U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA) announced on July 29. The strategy is being built around the introduction of reformulated doses, which Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech have vowed to have ready for distribution by then. Scientists hope the bivalent doses, which contain components from the BA.4 and BA.5 variants of the Omicron strain as well as some components from the original version of the virus, will offer greater protection from a possible fall and winter surge as the virus continues to evolve. Decisions on the fall vaccine strategy, including who should be boosted and when, fell to FDA; however, there was plenty [...]

New federal guidance on their obligations when it comes to dispensing reproductive health medications drugs puts pharmacists in a more precarious position instead of clarifying the issue—which was the stated intent of the Biden Administration—according to key pharmacy groups. The National Community Pharmacists Association (NCPA) asserted that pharmacists who are trying to abide by state laws on abortion could be caught in the middle by the guidance issued by the federal Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office of Civil Rights (OCR). "States have provided very little clarity on how pharmacists should proceed in light of conflicting state and federal laws and regulations. It is highly unfair for state and federal governments to threaten aggressive action against pharmacists who are just [...]

A group of 207 organizations strongly support the Pharmacy Benefit Manager Transparency Act (S. 4293) and urge Sens. Chuck Schumer (D, N.Y.) and Mitch McConnell (R, Ky.) to quickly bring it for a vote in the full Senate. The bill was introduced by Sens. Maria Cantwell (D, Wash.) and Chuck Grassley (R, Iowa) in May and passed the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation in June. “We applaud the recent efforts of the Commerce Committee to advance S. 4293 on a bipartisan basis as this legislation would bring needed transparency to and ultimately stop PBM-insurers’ unjust and deceptive practices, especially as the three largest PBM-insurers now control at least 80 percent of the market,” the organizations wrote in a letter sent [...]