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Advocacy Efforts | H.R. 6610 The Pharmacists Fight Back Act Coalition Letter

  • 2 days ago
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July 17, 2026

 

Honorable James Comer

Chairman

 

Honorable Robert Garcia

Ranking Member

 

Committee on Oversight and Government Reform

U.S. House of Representatives Washington, DC 20515

 

RE: Support for H.R. 6610, the Pharmacists Fight Back Act [in Federal Employee Health Benefits Program Act]

 

Dear Chairman Comer, Ranking Member Garcia, and Members of the Committee:

Representing a broad national coalition of healthcare providers, small business owners, patient advocates, and consumer advocates, we write to thank the Committee for its robust work exposing anti-competitive pharmacy benefit manager (PBM) practices over the last several years, and to strongly urge the Committee's swift consideration and passage of H.R. 6610. We are grateful to Chairman Comer for his direct leadership as a co-lead of this vital legislation. With 36 bipartisan cosponsors, including 11 distinguished members of this Committee, the robust support for H.R. 6610 reflects strong momentum for the meaningful reforms it contains.


The House Committee on Oversight and Reform has been an integral part of exposing problematic PBM practices including, without limitation, rebate games, patient steering, and unsustainable reimbursements to retail pharmacies. In addition to the work of this Committee, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has issued two Section 6(b) study interim reports alongside numerous state-level audits regarding PBM practices more broadly.


While Congress has taken meaningful action on PBM reform in Medicare Part D and the commercial market through the 2026 Consolidated Appropriations Act, PBM practices within the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program (FEHBP), one of the largest employer-sponsored health programs in the nation, covering over 8 million beneficiaries, remain largely unaddressed.

 

Importantly, recent Office of Personnel Management (OPM), Office of the Inspector General (OIG) audits of PBM practices within the FEHBP uncovered significant discrepancies and a pattern of PBM overcharges, including:


  • Identified $493 million in PBM overcharges, including $400.7 million in retail pharmacy discounts and $92.4 million in retail pharmacy transmission fees withheld from the plan.[1]

  • Identified $40 million in PBM overcharges including from the PBMs failure to pass-through retail pharmacy discounts and drug manufacturer rebates/discounts paid to the PBM and its offshore sister company.[2]

  • Uncovered $16.4 million in PBM overcharges including from the PBMs failure to pass-through retail pharmacy discounts, and drug manufacturer rebates from its offshore sister company.[3]

  • Identified $6.9 million in PBM overcharges from the PBMs failure to pass-through retail pharmacy transmission fees.[4]


Taken together, these plan-specific OIG audits, combined with broader nationwide findings of systematic under-reimbursement of community pharmacies and artificial markups at PBM-owned specialty pharmacies, underscore the urgent need to address non-transparent PBM drug pricing practices across all pharmacy channels. Ultimately, these findings reveal that PBMs are leveraging their positions as federal subcontractors within the FEHBP to benefit themselves and their affiliates to the detriment of patients, taxpayers, and non-affiliate community pharmacies. H.R. 6610 directly addresses these exact vulnerabilities and restores integrity to prescription drug pricing within the FEHBP through three core pillars:

  1. Establishing transparent, market-based pricing via a NADAC + 4% + professional dispensing fee model, which will bring underwater pharmacy claims up to a sustainable rate while capping PBM overcharges at their own affiliated pharmacies.

  2. Prohibiting post-adjudication pharmacy adjustments and point of sale pharmacy fees, explicitly cutting off the ability of PBMs to extract hidden fees and effectively ending predatory "spread pricing" games.

  3. Mandating a 100% pass-through of all manufacturer rebates, including those funneled through offshore GPOs, directly back to beneficiaries to ensure lower drug prices at the pharmacy counter.


Additionally, H.R. 6610 contains strong anti-steering provisions protecting patient choice of pharmacy provider, robust transparency reporting mandates, and strict civil penalties to serve as an effective deterrent.


The foregoing provisions will help protect community pharmacies from predatory contracting, shield federal enrollees from forced steering, and restore free market principles and fiscal accountability to a program that accounts for tens of billions in taxpayer dollars annually. By restructuring these incentives, H.R. 6610 will directly lower out-of-pocket costs for federal beneficiaries at the pharmacy counter while putting an end to the PBM overcharges that inflate premiums for employees and taxpayers alike.

H.R. 6610 provides the statutory teeth needed to stop these systemic PBM abuses and ensure that the FEHBP finally operates with the transparency and fairness that federal employees and American taxpayers deserve.


For these reasons, we strongly urge the Committee to swiftly pass H.R. 6610, the Pharmacists Fight Back Act. Thank you for your continued leadership and dedication to healthcare transparency.


Sincerely,


National Community Pharmacists

Association

National Alliance of State Pharmacy

Associations

Pharmacists United for Truth & Transparency

American Pharmacies

American Pharmacy Cooperative Inc

Compliant Pharmacy Alliance Cooperative

EPIC Rx

Independent Pharmacy Cooperative

Independent Pharmacy Alliance

Sav-Mor Pharmacy Services

American Economic Liberties Project

Global Healthy Living Foundation

Pioneer Institute

Local First Arizona

Minnesota Farmers Union

Advocates for Responsible Care

Rx in Reach Georgia Coalition

Unite for Safe Medications

Arizona Desert Life Pharmacy Patients

Organization

Alabama Independent Pharmacy Alliance

Alabama Pharmacy Association

Arizona Independent Pharmacy Coalition

Arizona Pharmacy Association

Arkansas Pharmacists Association

California Pharmacists Association

Colorado Pharmacists Society

Connecticut Pharmacists Association

Delaware Pharmacy Society

Florida Pharmacy Association

Florida Small Business Pharmacies Aligned

for Reform

Georgia Academy of Independent Pharmacy

Georgia Pharmacy Association

Illinois Pharmacists Association

Indiana Pharmacy Association

Kansas Pharmacists Association

Kentucky Independent Pharmacists Alliance

Kentucky Pharmacists Association

Louisiana Independent Pharmacies

Association

Maryland Pharmacists Association

Massachusetts Pharmacists Association

Michigan Independent Pharmacy Association

Michigan Pharmacists Association

Minnesota Independent Pharmacy

Association

Mississippi Independent Pharmacy

Association

Mississippi Pharmacists Association

Missouri Pharmacy Association

Missouri Pharmacy Business Council

Montana Pharmacy Association

Nebraska Pharmacists Association

Nevada Pharmacy Alliance

New Mexico Pharmacy Association

North Carolina Association of Pharmacists

Ohio Pharmacists Association

Pharmacists Society of the State of New York

SIP for PBM Reform

South Carolina Pharmacy Association

Tennessee Pharmacists Association

Texas Pharmacy Association

Virginia Pharmacy Association

Washington DC Pharmacy Association

Washington State Pharmacy Association

West Virginia Independent Pharmacy

Association


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