Ex-HHS head Price delayed rule fining Big Pharma for price gouging before resigning: report

[riversedge]

Source: raw story



30 Sep 2017 at 08:32 ET

Less than a day before Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price resigned from his cabinet position amid a week of controversy about his expensive travel habits, his department quietly moved to delay an Obamacare rule that would punish drug companies for knowingly price-gouging.

According to Mic, the rule was supposed to go into effect on Sunday, but on Thursday, the HHS department logged a delay into the federal register — the fourth time they’ve done so this year.

The Affordable Care Act established in 2010 a rule that aids the decades-old 340B program, which helps protect hospitals serving low-income patients from being overcharged for medications that should be discounted. Under the ACA rule, drug manufacturers found to have “knowingly and intentionally” price gouged could receive fines of up to $5,000 per instance of overcharging.

As Mic notes, bringing down the cost of prescriptions was one of President Donald Trump’s campaign promises, and since he’s taken office, he’s criticized “RIPOFF DRUG PRICES” on Twitter. In January, before his inauguration, Trump claimed the pharmaceutical industry was “getting away with murder” in a speech criticizing them and their lobby.....................

Read more: https://www.rawstory.com/2017/09/ex-hhs-head-price-delayed-rule-fining-big-pharma-for-price-gouging-before-resigning-report/

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Please call your reps and senators about this.

Link to tweet

Link to tweet

[Scarsdale]

1. Actions such as this

are why he was appointed in the first place, he fits in with the tRump administration perfectly. Screw the little guy, make the rich richer. As tRump said "He is a good man" Yeah, good for WHAT? Smarmy looking SOB.

[ck4829]

2. Yep, his mistake for Trump wasn't getting caught, it was that he couldn't look good while doing it

[Hortensis]

5. The tRump administration is the Koch alliance's, so yes. But why are

DUers focusing on the distracting, deluding orange curtain instead of the reality behind it?

Rump has no idea what HHS or does, he knows almost nothing and cares less about regulations on big pharm. All this evil plotting comes from BEHIND THE ORANGE CURTAIN. Price was the Kochs' man, and his replacement almost certainly will be also.

Of course, Robert Spencer is also fighting for power through pumpkin-whisperer, Steve Bannon, so there is a possibility the new HHS sec could be his agent instead, and/or part of Bannon's plot to destroy secular democracy.

[Dustlawyer]

3. Which company will hire him at an inflated salary now?

They want to show they reward those who look out for them. Wall Street does it all the time for their henchmen who take off for D.C. service. They come back to the private sector with a cushy job and high salary.

Eric Cantor got $1 million a year at a Wall Street bank after he lost his race in a surprise upset even though he had no banking experience.

[George II]

4. I wonder how much stock he sold during the time he delayed the fines?

[Scurrilous]

6. K&R