FTC, Express Scripts Trade Legal Salvos

  • Sep 20, 2024

    Just days after The Cigna Group’s Express Scripts sued the Federal Trade Commission over an interim report that criticized PBMs, the FTC revealed that it is suing Express Scripts, UnitedHealth Group’s Optum Rx, and CVS Health Corp.’s Caremark for “artificially inflating” insulin prices.

    The FTC said its administrative complaint also names the “Big Three” PBMs’ affiliated group purchasing organizations that serve as prescription drug rebate aggregators: CVS’s Zinc Health Services, Cigna’s Ascent Health Services, and UnitedHealth’s Emisar Pharma Services.

    The FTC alleges that the three PBMs, which together processing 80% of all prescription drug claims, “created a perverse drug rebate system that prioritizes high rebates from drug manufacturers, leading to artificially inflated insulin list prices.”

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  • Leslie Small

    Leslie has been working in journalism since 2009 and reporting on the health care industry since 2014. She has covered the many ups and downs of the Affordable Care Act exchanges, the failed health insurer mega-mergers, and hundreds of other storylines spanning subjects such as Medicaid managed care, Medicare Advantage, employer-sponsored insurance, and prescription drug coverage. As the managing editor of Health Plan Weekly and Radar on Drug Benefits, she writes and edits for both publications while overseeing a small team of reporters who also focus on the managed care sector. Before joining AIS Health, she was a senior editor for the e-newsletter Fierce Health Payer, and she started her career as a copy editor at multiple local newspapers. She graduated with a dual degree in journalism and political science from Penn State University.

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