Health care groups support state’s benefit regulation case
Thirty-one states and a number of health care associations, including the ADA, submitted amicus briefs to the Supreme Court supporting Oklahoma’s law regulating pharmacy benefit managers. The U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals struck down the law. If the court’s decision is allowed to stand it could significantly limit states’ discretion to regulate various health-related areas, including dental benefits.
Oklahoma’s 2019 law, the Patient’s Right to Pharmacy Choice Act, aims to ensure that rural patients have access to pharmacies by limiting pharmacy benefit manager practices that have been blamed for rising retail prices, reducing consumer choice and closing rural pharmacies. Oklahoma's insurance commissioner, Glen Mulready, appealed the 10th Circuit’s decision, arguing both that that the decision conflicted with Supreme Court precedent and that the court had overextended the reach of federal law — the Employee Retirement Income Security Act —thereby preempting the state’s authority to regulate pharmacy benefit managers.
The 10th Circuit’s decision is significant as it creates a split among the lower courts regarding whether federal law should supersede state regulation of pharmacy benefit managers. The state of Oklahoma believes that an overly broad interpretation of federal law gives pharmacy benefit managers too much power, effectively preventing states from protecting their pharmacies and their citizens.
Read More: Southwest Ledger News
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