The Pros and Cons of Allowing the Federal Government to Negotiate Prescription Drug Prices

Order Code RS22059
February 18, 2005
CRS Report for Congress
Received through the CRS Web
The Pros and Cons of Allowing the Federal
Government to Negotiate
Prescription Drug Prices
Jim Hahn
Analyst in Social Legislation
Domestic Social Policy Division
Summary
The Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement, and Modernization Act (MMA)
expressly forbids the Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) from negotiating
the price of prescription drugs on behalf of Medicare beneficiaries. This report outlines
the arguments for and against allowing the federal government to negotiate prescription
drug prices on behalf of Medicare beneficiaries. This report will be updated, as needed.
The Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement, and Modernization Act (MMA)
establishes a prescription drug benefit for Medicare beneficiaries under Part D, beginning
in 2006. One provision of MMA expressly forbids the Secretary of Health and Human
Services (HHS) from negotiating the price of prescription drugs on behalf of Medicare
beneficiaries.1 The MMA establishes that Medicare beneficiaries will receive the
prescription drug benefit through private organizations, typically insurers or similar
risk-bearing organizations, that sponsor prescription drug plans (PDPs). The PDPs (or
their agents) will negotiate prices with the drug manufacturers. In theory, the competition
among the PDPs will create strong incentives to negotiate price discounts, since the PDPs
will want to provide the drug benefit to Medicare beneficiaries as efficiently as possible
while simultaneously attracting enrollees through low premiums and cost-sharing
requirements.
This report discusses the pros and cons of allowing the federal government to
negotiate for lower prescription drug prices on behalf of Medicare beneficiaries. After
a brief background on the issue, the report analyzes the arguments commonly raised on
1 Section 1860D (i) reads, “NONINTERFERENCE. — In order to promote competition under
this part and in carrying out this part, the Secretary — (1) may not interfere with the negotiations
between drug manufacturers and pharmacies and PDP sponsors; and (2) may not require a
particular formulary or institute a price structure for the reimbursement of covered Part D drugs.”
The conference report adds that, “Conferees expect PDPs to negotiate price concessions directly
with manufacturers.” (H.Rept. 108-391, p. 461)
Congressional Research Service { The Library of Congress

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both sides of the debate, including a discussion of the relevance of the experience of the
Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) in negotiating lower prices for prescription drugs.
Background
The question of whether or not to allow the federal government the authority to
negotiate prices for Medicare beneficiaries arises as a consequence of price discrimination
on the part of pharmaceutical manufacturers. The pharmaceutical companies price
discriminate by selling the same commodity (prescription drugs) to different segments of
the market at different prices. This practice exists in part because the manufacturers may
have monopoly power, through their patents,2 and in part because of the numerous
channels of distribution from manufacturer to consumer (patient). Patents can provide
pharmaceutical manufacturers with a monopoly on their innovations making them the
sole provider of the product for the duration of the patent, currently twenty years from the
date of filing of the patent.3 As a result, the drug companies can and do charge different
prices to various buyers and market segments. Buyers facing a monopolist must decide
whether to accept the price offered or not to purchase the commodity at all.4 In the case
of prescription drugs, the buyers (wholesalers, pharmacy benefits managers (PBMs),
pharmacies, etc.) negotiate the best price they can for the quantity they wish to purchase.
Arguments in Support of Allowing the Federal
Government to Negotiate Drug Prices
The main argument advanced by advocates for granting the federal government the
power to negotiate is that lower prices for prescription drugs could be obtained and passed
on to Medicare beneficiaries. By using the market power of roughly 41 million Medicare
beneficiaries, proponents argue that the pharmaceutical companies would provide deep
discounts to the federal government in order to prevent the loss of a significant portion
of their market.
The magnitude of the discount that the federal government might be able to negotiate
is uncertain. At one extreme, the experience of the Secretary of VA in negotiating
discounted prices is often cited as an example of the types of discounts that might be
available to Medicare should the Secretary of HHS negotiate on behalf of Medicare
2 See, for example, CRS Report RL32377, The Hatch-Waxman Act: Legislative Changes
Affecting Pharmaceutical Patents,
by Wendy Schacht.
3 Because new pharmaceuticals need to be developed, tested, and approved before they can be
brought to market, products may not be commercially available until well into the patent life.
4 Where alternate products or substitutes exist, for instance, when generic drugs are available or
if there are other patented brand name products that can be considered therapeutic substitutes,
the monopolists’ power to charge monopoly (profit-maximizing) prices and to price discriminate
diminishes.

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beneficiaries.5 Through its negotiated contracts, VA obtains at least a 24% discount off
the manufacturers’ most favored commercial (non-federal) price for patented products.6
The Government Accountability Office (GAO) found that average VA-negotiated prices
are less than 50% of the non-federal average manufacturer’s price.7
There are substantial differences between Medicare and VA that draw into question
whether one experience is indicative of the other. VA is a direct provider of care and has
its own health care facilities. As a result, VA has a centralized formulary, warehouses and
a distribution network to transport supplies and materials, including prescription drugs,
to the facilities. The VA, through its health care system, is the purchaser of prescription
drugs. In contrast, the Medicare program is an insurer that pays for care that is delivered
to covered beneficiaries in a myriad of sites. Under the new Part D, which relies on
prescription drug plans (PDPs) or Medicare Advantage managed care plans offering a
prescription drug benefit (MA-PDs) to provide the drug benefit, Medicare is one step
further removed in its relationship with the beneficiary.
There may also be an efficiency argument for allowing the federal government to act
as the main or sole negotiator. The many transactions involved in bringing prescription
drugs from the manufacturer to the patient each present opportunities for affecting the
final price of the drug, as reflected in the substantial variation in retail prices. Cash
customers who buy drugs at retail pharmacies without insurance, or who are later
reimbursed by an insurer (such as Medicare) are conducting the last in a series of
transactions: prescription drugs are sold by a manufacturer to a wholesaler or other entity,
who in turn sells the product to a retailer such as a pharmacy, where most non-
institutionalized people acquire prescription drugs. If the retail pharmacy is being paid
by a pharmacy benefit manager (PBM), the PBM negotiates the prices it will pay for each
drug.8 Each transaction requires a mark-up from the previous price in order to cover the
handling and administrative costs, in addition to any profits. Having a single negotiator
might lead to the elimination of some steps in the distribution chain.
Another consequence of the federal government negotiating drug prices is that prices
might be more consistent and less variable across all beneficiaries. In contrast, under
MMA, beneficiaries who belong to different PDP/MA-PD plans could face different
prices, depending on what the individual organizations negotiate and pass on to
5 P.L. 102-585, the Veterans Health Care Act of 1992, authorizes the Veterans Affairs Secretary
to negotiate prices for covered drugs on behalf of the Department of Defense, the Public Health
Service (including the Indian Health Service) and the Coast Guard, in addition to Veterans
Affairs.
6 New generic manufacturers are not held to this restriction when patents expire, but the discount
on the original product remains.
7 U.S. GAO, Drug Prices: Effects of Opening Federal Supply Schedule for Pharmaceuticals Are
Uncertain
, Washington, June 1997 [GAO/HEHS-97-60].
8 Pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) are companies that administer prescription drug benefits
for health care plans. Administrative services include adjudicating claims and managing costs.
PBMs typically provide and manage networks of pharmacies willing to accept negotiated
discounts on drug prices and dispensing fees and may encourage the use of mail-service
pharmacies as a cost reduction technique. Clinical services include drug utilization review to
prevent potentially dangerous drug interactions.

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beneficiaries in savings. The recent experience with the Medicare prescription drug
discount cards suggests that having a plethora of choices is not universally viewed as a
positive outcome.
Arguments Against Allowing the Federal Government
to Negotiate Drug Prices
Detractors who oppose allowing the federal government to negotiate drug prices
present several philosophical and pragmatic arguments against this proposal. Critics
assert that the resulting discounts would not be significant; that the involvement of the
federal government would result in a more limited choice of drugs available at discount;
that the overall long-term effect of prescription drug discounts might be detrimental to the
non-Medicare population; or that the government would use its collective power to drive
down prices to the extent that research and development would suffer, resulting in less
innovation and fewer new products being brought to market.
Some critics doubt whether the discounts that the federal government might obtain
would be substantially different from those that private sector companies can or might be
able to negotiate. Large PBMs, such as Advance PCS (75 million covered individuals),
Medco Health Solutions (65 million) and Express Scripts (57 million) have significant
market power and an established track record negotiating prescription drug discounts for
large populations. For these reasons, critics claim that allowing the PBMs to negotiate
on behalf of Medicare beneficiaries would produce savings at least as great as anything
that the federal government could negotiate.9 The Congressional Budget Office (CBO),
at the request of congressional leaders, examined the effect of striking the
“noninterference” provision and estimated that it would have a negligible effect on federal
spending.10 Similarly, the Chief Actuary at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid
Services (CMS) concluded that giving the Secretary the ability to directly negotiate
prescription drug prices might not produce additional savings over what private plans
negotiate. Both CBO and the CMS Chief Actuary determined that the price concessions
extracted by the federal government might not exceed those that private plans might
achieve.
Proponents of a market-based, decentralized approach also believe that having a
variety of organizations negotiating different prices will result in more choices available
to Medicare beneficiaries and, therefore, better patient outcomes. Instead of being limited
to the discounted drugs Medicare negotiates, discounts for the plentitude of organizations
offering prescription drug plans will result in a broader range of drugs being discounted.
9 One counter argument to this point is that while large PBMs may cover more individuals than
the Medicare program, Medicare beneficiaries consume more prescription drugs per capita than
those under 65, so the Medicare market represents a greater share and therefore, more “clout.”
10 Letter from CBO to the Honorable William H. Frist, M.D., Estimate of the Effect of Striking
the “Noninterference” Provision as Added by P.L. 108-173, the Medicare Prescription Drug,
Improvement, and Modernization Act of 2003,
Jan. 23, 2004,
[http://www.cbo.gov/showdoc.cfm?index=4986&sequence=0]

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Beneficiaries will then be able to choose the plan that best meets their individual
prescription drug needs and acquire them at competitive market prices.
Because of the complex network of relationships in drug prices, the effect of
changing one price, such as negotiating a discount for Medicare beneficiaries, may have
indirect consequences on other prices. In the long run, critics argue while drug prices paid
by Medicare beneficiaries may fall, overall drug prices may increase for other consumers,
specifically for the under-65 population. Under this argument, pharmaceutical companies
who lose the ability to set discriminatory prices in one segment of the market would adjust
by increasing the prices they charge to other segments. In particular, VA-negotiated
prices could increase substantially, affecting the VA/DoD population. The success of this
strategy is uncertain, but would depend in part on the price sensitivity of demand in the
other segments of the market.
Finally, those who oppose government involvement in prescription drug price
negotiations claim that the government would be setting prices, not negotiating. They cite
the experience in other parts of the Medicare program, where provider reimbursement
under Parts A and B are set by the Medicare program, and claim that the federal
government would impose a similarly rigid pricing schedule on the prescription drug
market. Pharmaceutical manufacturers have stated that research and development will
suffer if retail prices are diminished and returns from investment are squeezed. While this
is undoubtedly true in the extreme, there is very little evidence that quantifies the degree
to which reductions in retail prices would lead to fewer new products being introduced.