Health Care

Arkansas targets PBMs with first-in-nation bill

Its sponsors say the proposal would reduce ‘anticompetitive practices’ in the pharmacy market.
A CVS Pharmacy in the Harlem neighborhood of New York City. (AP Photo/Ted Shaffrey, File)

Arkansas would block pharmacy benefit managers from owning pharmacies under first-in-the nation legislation being considered in the House.

The bill, perhaps the most aggressive state-led effort to overhaul the pharmacy benefit manager industry in recent years, would force some of the country’s biggest health care conglomerates — including CVS’s Caremark, Cigna’s Express Scripts and UnitedHealth Group’s Optum Rx — to break up their businesses to operate in the state.

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