News Briefs: Humana Wins in Rite Aid Reimbursement Dispute

AllianceRx Walgreens Prime — a specialty and home delivery pharmacy business owned by Walgreens Boots Alliance — is rebranding to AllianceRx Walgreens Pharmacy. The move comes after Walgreens assumed full ownership of the business; previously, it was a joint venture between Walgreens and the PBM Prime Therapeutics. In addition to the company’s name change, it promoted Tracey James, R.Ph., from the role of senior vice president to chief operating officer.

Rite Aid Corp. must pay Humana Inc. $123 million after an arbitrator found that the retail pharmacy chain inflated reimbursement claims above the “usual and customary” prices for drugs, Stat reported. Rite Aid’s rival Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc. faces a similar lawsuit brought by several Blue Cross and Blue Shield affiliates. In both cases, the payers allege that the pharmacy chain systematically charged the health plans inflated prices for generic prescription fills. The health plans claim that their contracts with the pharmacies entitled them to reimburse the pharmacies for drug fills at the lowest price that the pharmacies charged for the drug in question, an arrangement called “usual and customary” pricing. However, the health plans say that the pharmacies charged cash-paying customers less than the “usual and customary” price submitted to health plans for reimbursement. Rite Aid plans to ask a federal court to vacate the arbitrator’s decision in the Humana case, per Stat, while the Walgreens-Blues suit is pending.

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• Radar on Drug Benefits