Vote for Rural Iowa – Pass PBM Reform

Every year it seems like rural Iowa loses another key to our community – a grocery store, a newspaper, a hometown restaurant, or Main Street boutique. Local pharmacies top this list, with 55 closing across our state since 2018. Unfortunately, the trend will continue as long as Pharmacy Benefit Managers (PBMs) go unchecked.
A little-known industry with an outside influence on our health care, PBMs act as a middleman between our health insurance plans, employers, and pharmaceutical manufacturers. They dictate which drugs patients can receive, where they can go to get them, and how much pharmacies receive to dispense them. They have consolidated tremendously in the past decade, and now the top three PBMs own nearly 80 percent of the market. This leverage makes it impossible to negotiate against and easy to make enormous profits. In fact, the top three PBMs land squarely in the top 15 of Fortune 100 companies.
This year, the Iowa legislature has followed several other states to reform this industry and bring transparency to the system. The Iowa House voted 96-0 to pass a bill that will protect patient choice, bolster our pharmacies to address reimbursement issues, and allow Iowans to be served by their local pharmacist instead of sending them to out-of-state mail-order pharmacies.
Rural Iowa attracts folks that want to spend their time and resources locally. Every time we lose an important pillar of our community, it makes it harder to keep things local. The Iowa Senate has an opportunity to pass SF2231/HF2384 and bring stability back to Iowa pharmacies and their patients. I hope it does so urgently.
Matt Hummel
Pharmacist/Owner, Booth Pharmacy
Hawarden