According to the final rule issued last week, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services formally abolished a Trump-era policy that would prevent Medicare from paying more for certain outpatient drugs than the lowest prices paid by other wealthy countries. .

According to CMS, all but one of the 34 commenters on the proposed rule support the withdrawal of the policy.

“We will continue to carefully consider the feedback from this commenter and the feedback we received from other stakeholders, as we are exploring all options for including value in medical insurance Part B drug payments to improve beneficiaries’ access to evidence-based care , And reduce consumer spending on drugs and the entire healthcare system,” said the final rule.

The Trump administration issued a provisional final rule in November last year, which will implement a policy known as the most-favored-nation model nationwide starting from January 1, 2021, for a period of seven years. The Federal Court prevented the policy from taking effect in December of last year, and it has now been shelved shortly after the Biden administration took office.Content management system suggested The rule was cancelled in August on the grounds of legal issues in the Trump era model. The final rule on December 29 came into effect on February 28.

Hospitals, suppliers and pharmaceutical companies Pan Demonstrations claim that this will impair patients’ access to medicines and hinder their own financial prospects.Although the model is considered a way to reduce the price of medicines, it Not specified Do drugmakers have to lower the prices of healthcare providers, which means that providers may have to provide drugs at a financial loss.

Suppliers also disagree with the Trump administration’s push to enforce the model nationwide. Most demonstrations of the Medicare and Medicaid Innovation Center are voluntary, last only a few years, and have only a few participants.

CMS’ decision to cancel the model gave participants in the healthcare industry a sigh of relief.

“The revised reimbursement methods for certain Part B drugs will punish medical practices and some of the most vulnerable beneficiaries they treat. We support finding feasible solutions to reduce drug costs and expenditures, but will not sacrifice the country’s physician practices and The patient is the price,” Claire Ernst, director of government affairs for the Medical Group Management Association, said in a statement after the rule was lifted.

In fact, the Biden administration has proposed other ideas for controlling the cost of prescription drugs.President Joe Biden’s Executive order Regarding the increasing competition, the US Food and Drug Administration instructed the Food and Drug Administration to cooperate with states to import drugs from Canada and encouraged regulators to prevent pharmaceutical companies from avoiding competition with generic drug manufacturers.

Biden also asked HHS to publish a copy of Report on reducing drug pricesThe report was released in September, recommending rewards to suppliers that provide biosimilars, and stated that a small-scale mandatory model may be considered, linking prescription drugs and biosimilars with improved patient prognosis and other factors. But HHS did not delve into the details or the next steps, mainly to listen to the opinions of Congress.

The agency can even promote a new model that is basically similar to the most-favored-nation policy. Rachel Sachs, a law professor at Washington University in St. Louis, wrote in an e-mail that the Biden administration’s problems with this policy appear to be primarily based on legal considerations.