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Doctors are hoarding medications touted as possible coronavirus treatments by writing prescriptions for themselves and family members, according to pharmacy boards in states across the country...The stockpiling has become so worrisome in Idaho, Kentucky, Ohio, Nevada, Oklahoma, North Carolina, and Texas that the boards in those states have issued emergency restrictions or guidelines on how the drugs can be dispensed at pharmacies. More states are expected to follow suit...None of the drugs have been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for that use. Some of them — including chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine — are commonly used to treat malaria, lupus, rheumatoid arthritis and other conditions...Carmen Catizone, executive director of the National Association of Boards of Pharmacy, said state boards across the country were “trying to stop the hoarding and inappropriate prescribing, but balancing what patients need.”...READ MORE

A Biogen employee who allegedly concealed her coronavirus symptoms on a flight back to China may face criminal charges. But first, the biotech has decided it wants nothing to do with the rogue staffer...“She is no longer an employee of Biogen,” a company spokesperson told FiercePharma...According to Biogen, the former employee, a woman surnamed Li, ignored health experts’ guidance and “made the personal decision to travel to China without informing the company.”...Li told local authorities she attended the ill-fated Biogen management meeting at the Marriott Long Wharf hotel in Boston on Feb. 26 and Feb. 27, which as of Thursday has been linked to 97 COVID-19 cases in Massachusetts and multiple cases in other states. But the people at Biogen said Li did not attend the meeting because it wasn't an event for her...READ MORE

The British Government has banned companies from buying up drugs used on intensive care wards and selling them to hospitals in other countries...The Department of Health has announced that the exporting of certain drugs including painkillers, antibiotics and anaesthetics will no longer be allowed...This ban on international sale of the drugs is intended to shore up Britain's supplies of drugs which are crucial for treating intensive care patients...Increasing numbers of people will need to be admitted to critical care units in the coming weeks and the Government must move to make sure they can be looked after. Although bed capacity is an issue, banning the drugs is one way hospitals can make sure their supplies don't run dry...READ MORE

The HHS Office for Civil Rights announced... that during the coronavirus pandemic it will use discretion when enforcing HIPAA-compliance for telehealth communications tools...Even though some of those technologies may not fully comply with HIPAA requirements, OCR says it "will not impose penalties for noncompliance with the regulatory requirements under the HIPAA Rules against covered health care providers in connection with the good faith provision of telehealth during the COVID-19 nationwide public health emergency."...Covered entities seeking to use audio or video communication tech to reach patients where they live "can use any non-public facing remote communication product that is available to communicate with patients," said the agency. "This exercise of discretion applies to telehealth provided for any reason, regardless of whether the telehealth service is related to the diagnosis and treatment of health conditions related to COVID-19."...READ MORE

Gov. Steve Sisolak has signed an emergency measure to safeguard the threatened supply of two drugs being hoarded for possible use in the treatment of COVID-19...The governor signed the emergency regulation Tuesday on the recommendation of the state Board of Pharmacy...The drugs, chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine, are used to treat malaria, lupus and rheumatoid arthritis and are being studied by the Food and Drug Administration for possible use in patients with mild-to-moderate COVID-19...The governor’s order prohibits the prescribing and dispensing chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine for a COVID-19 diagnosis, requires the appropriate prescription coding for their “legitimate medical purposes” and limits prescriptions to a 30-day supply...The order doesn’t limit use of the drugs in hospitals, only in outpatient settings where hoarding is evident, the governor’s office stressed. Doctors may continue to prescribe them to hospitalized COVID-19 patients at their discretion...READ MORE

As efforts to discover new COVID-19 medicines roll on, President Donald Trump and others this week focused attention on the decades-old malaria drug chloroquine. Bayer got things rolling with an initial donation of the drug, and now Novartis, Mylan and Teva are taking steps to deliver tens of millions of tablets...Chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine, a more tolerable formulation, are not approved to treat COVID-19. Still, U.S. authorities and others are exploring their potential following encouraging preliminary results...In response, Novartis has pledged a global donation of up to 130 million hydroxychloroquine tablets, pending regulatory approvals for COVID-19. Mylan is ramping up production at its West Virginia Facility with enough supplies to make 50 million tablets. Teva is donating 16 million tablets to hospitals around the U.S...READ MORE

Christina Mattina, welcome to This Week in Managed Care from the Managed Markets News Network

Overwhelmed by demand for an experimental treatment for coronavirus, the drug maker Gilead abruptly shut down its emergency access program, leaving doctors and families scrambling for answers...The company said it was setting up a broader access program that could try to help more people, but some said the transition is delaying remedies for very ill patients who have few options...Gilead said emergency requests had “flooded an emergency treatment access system that was set up for very limited access to investigational medicines and never intended for use in response to a pandemic.”...Gilead said it was switching to a broader program because it could not handle individual requests. “Due to overwhelming demand over the last several days, during this transition period we are unable to accept new individual compassionate use requests,” the company said on Sunday, with the exception of pregnant women and children under 18. “This approach will both accelerate access to remdesivir for severely ill patients and enable the collection of data from all participating patients,” the company said...READ MORE

Nevada Gov. Steve Sisolak announced Sunday afternoon a statewide task force to help mitigate the spread of COVID-19...The task force will be led by Jim Murren, former CEO of MGM Resorts International...to focus "immediately marshalling and organizing all of Nevada’s private sector resources in support of the local and State Government’s already robust efforts to tackle COVID-19."...READ MORE

As the novel coronavirus crisis continues, one key issue for pharmacists, other health care professionals, and patients is the potential for drug shortages in the United States...There is growing concern because although reserves exist, China experienced a drop-off in drug production during the height of its COVID-19 outbreak, though that is leveling off. And India, another big supplier, has also said that it will keep some of the medications it makes on reserve...“We are now starting to see spot shortages for a few different products, in part due to disease progression around the world, especially across Europe, which is a large producer of drugs,”... the FDA has announced a drug shortage caused by the COVID-19 outbreak but has not identified the drug or the country where it is made, in an effort to prevent hoarding and panic...READ MORE