For Too Long, Insulin Manufacturers and Pharmacy Benefit Managers Have Derived Unjust Economic Benefit from Diabetes Patients and State Taxpayers. Attorney General Landry Seeks to Reverse the Damage
BATON ROUGE, LA (March 15, 2023) – Louisiana Independent Pharmacies Association (LIPA) issued the following statement in response to Attorney General Jeff Landry’s lawsuit naming Sanofi-Aventis U.S., LLC and Novo Nordisk, Inc, two the nation’s largest insulin manufacturers; and pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) CaremarkPCS Health, Express Scripts, OptumRx; and CVS Health, the corporate parent company of Caremark PCS, as culpable parties responsible for irreparable physical and financial harm to the state’s diabetes patients, their families, and taxpayers.
“Louisiana’s independent pharmacies applaud the Attorney General for this effort to seek justice for the unjust, opaque practices by a number of extremely powerful entities who appear to have colluded in order to make the most money possible off of a medication meant to be affordable and accessible to diabetic patients.
“For too long, insulin manufacturers and PBMs have derived grossly inflated economic benefit and financial gains by engaging together in practices that resulted in rapidly escalating insulin prices year after year, while also adding excessive markup to the State of Louisiana for processing insulin prescription claims through Louisiana Medicaid.
“Diabetes is a public health crisis no less insidious than the opioid crisis and nearly as pervasive. Diabetic patients depend on access to insulin for survival. That so many Louisianans have been forced to engage in rationing or foregoing treatment altogether is criminal, and those responsible for pricing diabetic patients out of the very medication they need to survive should be held fully accountable.”
For more information about AG Landry’s lawsuit, visit http://www.ag.state.la.us/Article/13122. For additional information about how Louisiana’s independent pharmacies are fighting for patients’ right to accessible and affordable medication, or for a directory of local independent pharmacies, visit LIPA.org.
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