{"id":10615,"date":"2019-08-09T19:03:21","date_gmt":"2019-08-09T19:03:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/?p=10615"},"modified":"2019-08-09T19:03:21","modified_gmt":"2019-08-09T19:03:21","slug":"texas-group-calls-for-prompt-passage-of-drug-pricing-reforms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/?p=10615","title":{"rendered":"Texas Group Calls for Prompt Passage of Drug-Pricing Reforms"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The U.S. Senate Finance Committee will meet Thursday to discuss the Prescription Drug Pricing Reduction Act of 2019. Photo: Andy Dean\/Adobe Stock<\/p><\/div>\n

by Mary Schuermann Kuhlman<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

AUSTIN, Texas \u2013<\/strong>\u00a0As efforts to bring down the cost of prescription medications intensify on Capitol Hill, some Texas groups say it can\u2019t come fast enough.<\/p>\n

The U.S. Senate Finance Committee meets Thursday to debate the bipartisan\u00a0Prescription Drug Pricing Reduction Act of 2019<\/a>. Charles Cascio, associate state director of advocacy and outreach for\u00a0AARP Texas<\/a>, is in Washington to meet with Texas\u2019 congressional leaders, including Republican Sen. John Cornyn, who is on the Senate Finance Committee.<\/p>\n

Cascio said he\u2019s sharing the struggles of older Texans who can\u2019t afford the medications they need.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have 2.28 million members in Texas,\u201d he said. \u201cOf those, on average, the seniors take between four and five prescriptions a month. And, on average, they have an income of $26,000 a year. This is a lot of medications on a very tight, fixed budget.\u201d<\/p>\n

The legislation would add an out-of-pocket maximum for Medicare beneficiaries and penalize prescription-drug companies for prices that rise faster than inflation. According to the Congressional Budget Office, the changes would save Medicare $85 billion and save beneficiaries $27 billion in out-of-pocket costs over 10 years.<\/p>\n

Cascio said Medicare spends more than $125 billion annually on prescription drugs, and the price for seniors with chronic conditions averages roughly $13,000 a year. That\u2019s why he believes reducing out-of-pocket costs is crucial.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhatever redesign that they do of Medicare Part D, which is the prescription drug benefit for seniors,\u201d he said, \u201cwe just want to ensure that the program is better off afterward, and that anything that seniors have to pay for out of their pocket doesn\u2019t increase.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cornyn also is working on a measure that would target specific patents within the drug market. When it comes to reducing drug prices, Cascio said, more competition and improved access to generics are better.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat it would do is really get at the issue of the numerous patents that many brand-name drug companies have on certain drugs that keep lower-cost generic alternatives out of the system,\u201d he said, \u201cand so we appreciate Sen. Cornyn and his work on that effort.\u201d<\/p>\n

The U.S. House is expected to move on similar legislation after its August recess.<\/p>\n

More information is online at\u00a0finance.senate.gov<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Mary Schuermann Kuhlman AUSTIN, Texas \u2013\u00a0As efforts to bring down the cost of prescription medications intensify on Capitol Hill, some Texas groups say it can\u2019t come fast enough. The U.S. Senate Finance Committee meets Thursday to debate the bipartisan\u00a0Prescription Drug Pricing Reduction Act of 2019. Charles Cascio, associate state director of advocacy and outreach […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":10616,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10615","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-state"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10615","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10615"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10615\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10617,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10615\/revisions\/10617"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/10616"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10615"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10615"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10615"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}