FTC Punts Probe of PBMs but Could Take Up Issue Again
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) won’t investigate PBMs’ business practices, despite considering a probe in a Feb. 17 meeting. The FTC’s four commissioners deadlocked 2-2 on a party line vote authorizing an investigation, with the two Democratic commissioners voting in favor of an investigation and the two Republicans voting against it.
During the meeting, according to a transcript prepared by the agency, FTC Chair Lina Khan, a Democrat, proposed “the use of the commission’s investigative authority under section 6B of the FTC Act to issue orders to large pharmacy benefit managers, to study a range of their commercial practices, to give us better insight into their drug pricing practices and their contracts with pharmacies, including for the purpose of examining whether those contracts negatively impact independent or unaffiliated pharmacies over recent decades.”
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