340B Drug Pricing Program Contributes to Rising Healthcare Costs and Is Ripe for Reform
The U.S. House Energy & Commerce Committee's Health Subcommittee today will host the third hearing in its health care affordability series, specifically examining the role providers and hospitals play in shaping the cost of care for Americans.
While the hearing will likely examine numerous issues, there is none more ripe for reform than the flawed 340B drug pricing program.
Originally enacted to help eligible safety-net providers buy medicines at steep discounts and pass the savings on to lower-income and vulnerable patients, the program has ballooned as a revenue stream for many participating hospitals and contract pharmacy chains.
As the size and complexity of the 340B program has expanded, participating hospitals and contract pharmacies have instead used the program to increase…[more]
One of the more popular complaints of the contemporary left is that the Constitution subverts "democracy" for "minority rule."
If the United States is really more divided than ever, we have even less reason to dispense with the mechanisms and institutions that diffuse power and constrain one side of the divide from lording over the other. Institutions like the Electoral College and the Senate temper divisions.
Yet, the anti-constitutionalist's argument usually has two strands that (illogically) intersect. The first is to assert that the Constitution is a work of slave-owning…
