Category:

...Congress held an oversight hearing for one of the biggest federal programs -- yet most Americans have never heard of it...Congress established the 340B Drug Discount Program in 1992 to make medicines more affordable for poor Americans. Unfortunately, as lawmakers have learned, the program hasn't panned out as planned...In the 30-plus years since its enactment, the hospital industry has systematically gamed 340B. Today, the program scheme is little more than an enormously expensive corporate welfare scheme masquerading as a cost saving program...The flagrant abuse of a well-intentioned initiative is not merely a waste of public resources. It's a disservice to the struggling patients 340B is supposed to help. It's time for Congress to clean up this mess...READ MORE

The court found that anti-abortion doctors who questioned the FDA’s easing of access to the pill did not have legal standing to sue...The Supreme Court on Thursday rejected a challenge to the abortion pill mifepristone, meaning the commonly used drug can remain widely available...The court found unanimously that the group of anti-abortion doctors who questioned the Food and Drug Administration’s decisions making it easier to access the pill did not have legal standing to sue. As a result, the lawsuit will be dismissed...READ MORE

Over the past few years, a unique pharmacy operation has been making waves in the Pacific Northwest. Chris Schaffner is a pharmacist by trade, but he also serves as the owner of Apothecary Coffee, a co-located coffee shop attached to his other business, Schaffner Pharmacy. Opening the pharmacy in 2018 and the coffee shop in 2022, Schaffner and his staff have achieved great success in the community pharmacy industry...READ MORE

Alabama, unless blocked by the U.S. Supreme Court, will attempt to put an inmate to death with nitrogen gas on Thursday night, a never before used execution method that the state claims will be humane but critics call cruel and experimental...Kenneth Eugene Smith, a 58-year-old convicted killer whose 2022 lethal injection was called off at the last minute because authorities couldn’t connect an IV line, is scheduled to be executed at a south Alabama prison...READ MORE

The U.S. Supreme Court voted to block a controversial bankruptcy deal for Purdue Pharma, the drug company at the center of the opioid crisis, on Thursday...The narrow 5-4 ruling rejected a nationwide bankruptcy settlement from proceeding with the company, and it potentially exposes the company's owners--the Sackler family--to civil consequences...READ MORE

2023 was another tough year for pharmacists working in retail settings. While average salaries grew, they did not keep pace with overall inflation. Pharmacist employment at drug stores shrank but grew at supermarkets and mass merchants...Meanwhile, employment and salaries in non-retail settings—hospitals, physician offices, outpatient centers, and home healthcare—continued to grow. These settings now employ one in three U.S. pharmacists. Greener grass—or just different soil?...READ MORE

The Justice Department took a significant step toward rescheduling marijuana Thursday, formalizing its process to reclassify the drug as lower-risk and remove it from a category in which it has been treated as more dangerous than fentanyl and meth...President Joe Biden announced the “major” move in a direct-to-camera video posted to his official account on X. “This is monumental,” Biden said in the message. “It’s an important move towards reversing long-standing inequities. … Far too many lives have been upended because of a failed approach to marijuana, and I’m committed to righting those wrongs. You have my word on it.”...The Biden administration has been signaling that it would move to reschedule the drug from Schedule I — a strict classification including drugs like heroin — to the less-stringent Schedule III, which would for the first time acknowledge the drug’s medical benefits at the federal level. The Drug Enforcement Administration submitted a notice of proposed rulemaking in the Federal Register on Thursday afternoon, triggering a 60-day comment period that will allow members of the public to submit remarks regarding the rescheduling proposal before it is finalized...READ MORE

Pharmacy professionals organizing at two CVS corporate retail stores in Rhode Island have won their union election with The Pharmacy Guild, becoming the first stores in the nation to unionize in CVS’ homestate. The victories mark the continuation of a historic wave of pharmacy organizing. These election results are the second and third union election wins by workers organizing with TPG in just four weeks, as pharmacy professionals fight for a better industry for themselves and their patients...READ MORE

Virginia Commonwealth University’s new Bachelor of Science in Pharmaceutical Sciences degree will prepare students to step into pharma jobs like quality assurance technicians, research technologists and laboratory technicians, according to Kelechi “K.C.” Ogbonna, dean of VCU’s School of Pharmacy...“What’s different about this program is many of those programs were designed as feeder programs for a professional degree or a graduate degree,” Ogbonna said. “A lot of those programs were not focused on … being a standalone program that is hands on, where they’re actually translating what they learned in the classroom and in internships and externships and getting familiarity and understanding with certain tools and instruments, assurance methodologies.”...READ MORE

I was unaware the loss of our drugstores was a nationwide trend until reading an article by Karen Kerrigan, president and CEO of the Small Business & Entrepreneurship Council. She reported that mom-and-pop drugstores in rural areas were particularly hard hit, leaving about 630 rural communities with no pharmacy by 2018. Kerrigan reported that the big chains closed nearly 2,000 pharmacies between 2017 and 2020 with more planned. CNN Business reported CVS will be closing another 900 stores in 2024. Walgreens and Rite Aid are also in the process of closing hundreds...Competition and the upsurge in shoplifting in soft-on-crime big cities are not the main causes. Kerrigan placed most of the blame on third-party Pharmacy Benefit Managers...READ MORE