America’s economically disadvantaged patients can point in two directions when talking about what is wrong with the 340B Drug Pricing Program, which is designed to help hospitals caring for underserved communities — and the patients they treat — keep necessary medicines reasonably priced: large supposedly “nonprofit” hospitals and for-profit pharmacy benefit managers that serve as 340B contract pharmacies, which together divert billions of dollars in savings that should be helping patients in need.
Begun in 1992, 340B is a federal program that requires drug manufacturers to provide significant discounts to eligible health care organizations that are supposed to treat high numbers of uninsured and low-income patients. This program is critically important to hemophilia, AIDS, and other community clinics known as grantees.