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The Ohio Department of Insurance said...that pharmacy benefit managers and insurers would have to disclose the lowest price for a prescription drug for Ohio consumers, part of a move to prevent insured consumers potentially paying more than those without insurance...Two of the largest pharmacy benefit managers, Express Scripts Holding Co. and CVS Health Inc said their contracts include clauses by which members receive the lowest cost automatically...The agency said it would ban the practice in which some insurers and pharmacy benefit managers use contractual provisions to prevent pharmacists from discussing with consumers if low-cost options are available for prescriptions, effective immediately...It would also prohibit them from charging customers a higher amount for prescription drugs than what it would otherwise cost without insurance coverage

Safety issues with first female libido pill (Addyi,flibanserin) may spur better alternatives for women...Most women with low sexual desire won't rush to get the first prescription drug to boost female libido when it becomes available…But they may…spur development of better treatments for women's sexual problems after more than a decade of neglect by most of the world's large drugmakers…Treatments for women's libido issues are an untapped financial opportunity for drugmakers. Analysts estimate the market could be worth over $2 billion, based on academic estimates that between 5 million and 9 million U.S. women may suffer from desire disorders.

In an effort to differentiate itself, CVS Health is looking to tap into the 24.8% of the workplace the Bureau of Labor Statistics projects will be aged 55 years and older by 2024. The company — which currently has a workforce that is 24% older than 50 years of age — has announced that it’s actively recruiting older employees...Mature workers play an integral role in the culture at CVS Health by providing increased experience, dependability and a desire to learn new skills...the company’s efforts around mature workers is its Talent Is Ageless initiative, which was created to recruit and retain employees aged 50 years and older by cultivating public and private partnerships...9% of Americans aged 65 and older are using at least one prescription drug a month, and 40% use at least five...we see the baby boomer generation age, having colleagues across the company who can personally relate to these customers and patients is a differentiator for us...

...first FDA-approved drug (Addyi,flibanserin) for female sexual dysfunction is available in the United States today (Oct. 17), marking a much-anticipated milestone for women who struggle with sexual desire. Sprout, the pharmaceutical company behind the drug, has spent $50m to develop the treatment. But female sexual desire is biologically complex, and this drug won’t work like similar products for men. Here are the key details:

• Who is it for?
• How does it work?
• What are the effects?
• What are the risks?
• How much will it cost?

On May 19, 1983, Boots aired the first broadcast television commercial in the United States for a prescription drug, the pain reliever Rufen...Within 48 hours of the ad’s airing, the federal government told the company to take it down. And more than 30 years later, the fight over marketing prescription drugs directly to the public is still raging...Now, the American Medical Association, the largest doctors group in the United States, wants to stop direct-to-consumer advertising for prescription drugs in the belief that the ads encourage patients to seek medicines unnecessarily. But the effort to have drug ads banned alongside tobacco ads will face plenty of obstacles, none bigger than the First Amendment. Perhaps the most unusual thing about this decades-long saga is that it’s an issue at all...The United States is one of only two countries in the world to allow these ads. How did this little-noted example of American exceptionalism come to be?...It started with Boots.

Consumer Reports’ poll shows one-third of Americans hit by high drug prices…Not all surprises are good, especially when that surprise means you pay more for a prescription drug you take all the time. Yet in the last 12 months, that’s exactly what happened...People said they paid an average of $39 above the usual cost for their prescription—and one in 10 said they paid a whopping $100 or more out-of-pocket..