Douglas Announces New Rx Drug Pool for Vermont

Governor Douglas Announces New Rx Drug Pool for Vermont
Montpelier -- Governor Jim Douglas has announced he will propose a
program to help Vermont's employers' pool their purchasing power to
negotiate lower prescription drug prices for their employees.
"This new pooling program will allow participating employers to afford
prescription drug benefits for their employees by taking advantage of bulk
purchasing discounts," the Governor said.
Governor Douglas said this effort is modeled on the multi-state purchasing
pool he formed with Michigan in 2003, the nation's first successful
multi-state buying pool for Medicaid drugs. This pool saved Vermont $2
million in the last fiscal year and is expected to save $ 3 million this
year.
"This is exactly the kind of innovative thinking Vermont needs," Douglas
said. "Just as we have done with the Multi-State Pool, this in-state pool
is a creative way to enhance leverage with the nation's large
pharmaceutical companies, and use real pressure to drive down costs."
The formula for buying pools is simple; as participation in the pool grows
so too does the savings.
"I'm very excited about the potential of this new program. It is a good
way to put pressure on the drug industry and help drive down prescription
drug costs for employees," Governor Douglas said."
This new bulk buying pool is a market-based solution to the increasing
cost of pharmaceuticals, and as more states see that this is an effort
that works, just has it has in the multi-state pool, drug costs will
decline further.
Governor Douglas stressed that pooling programs demonstrate that solutions
to the increasing cost of pharmaceuticals are not artificial price or
government-run health care. "These pooling programs prove that using
purchasing power to lower costs can work, and there is no need for
government-run health care that empowers politicians rather than
patients," he said.
Governor Douglas also reiterated his proposals to require health care
plans to disclose drug prices to doctors and patients and offer value
price alternatives for generic drugs.
COMPREHENSIVE HEALTH CARE REFORM
The Governor's plan to help companies to pool together to negotiate for
lower drug prices comes one week after Douglas presented his second
comprehensive plan-A Prescription for a Healthy Vermont-for making
quality, affordable health care available to every Vermonter.
By including the Fit and Healthy Kids and Chronic Care initiatives,
long-term care reforms, a healthy aging initiative, prescription drug
price reduction efforts, and commitments to reducing substance abuse and
encouraging healthy choices, Douglas has made comprehensive and long-term
reform of Vermont's health care delivery system and improving the overall
health of Vermonters a central component of his plan to reduce health care
costs.
"We need to do more than just change who pays the bill. If costs continue
to increase at the current rate, it won't matter what pocket the money
comes from because they'll all be empty," the Governor has said. "That is
why I have offered true reforms that tackle the root causes of rising
health care costs, opens our system up to low cost options, encourages
healthy decisions and preventative care, and attacks health concerns at
their inception before they develop into more serious and costly
ailments."
Douglas says Vermont needs to maintain a patient-centered system that
offers more individual choice and keeps health care decisions in the hands
of patients and doctors, not government bureaucrats.
To lower the cost of health insurance, Governor Douglas proposed a plan
that would immediately reduce premiums by 15 percent for every Vermonter
with an individual insurance plan; offer low and middle income Vermonters
a premium discount of up to 60 percent; reduce, by up to 50 percent, the
cost for a small business to start providing insurance to employees; and
decrease the number of uninsured Vermonters by 20 percent in the first
year alone.
"But we won't stop there," Douglas stressed. "I will work every year to
make progress toward our goal of affordable and accessible health care for
everyone."