HEALTH & LIFE SCIENCES NEWS
HEALTH & LIFE SCIENCES NEWS
Exploring Critical Business and Legal Issues across the Healthcare and Life Sciences Industries
HEALTH & LIFE SCIENCES NEWS
Exploring Critical Business and Legal Issues across the Healthcare and Life Sciences Industries
340B
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This Week in 340B: February 7 – 13, 2023

This weekly series provides brief summaries to help you stay in the know on how 340B cases are developing across the country. Each week we comb through the dockets on more than 40 340B cases to provide you with a quick summary of relevant updates from the prior week in this industry-shaping body of litigation.

Issues at Stake: Contract Pharmacy; HRSA Audit Process; Medicare Payment Cuts
Where Things Stand:

  • In one contract pharmacy case, the court ordered a stay pending the D.C. Circuit Court’s ultimate decision in Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corp. v. Johnson and United Therapeutics Corp. v. Johnson.
  • The 340B Covered Entity plaintiff in one case asked that the court take specific discovery actions with respect to its challenge of the definition of “patient.”
  • Six Medicare payment cut cases were ordered stayed until May 19, 2023, pending a decision in AHA v. Becerra regarding remedies.
  • In three Medicare payment cut cases, the district court judge has signaled her inclination to transfer the cases to the judge handling most other Medicare payment cut cases, and has asked for the parties to enter any objections to a transfer.

Get more details on these 340B cases with the 340B Litigation Tracker, a subscription product from McDermott+Consulting.




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340B in 2021: What Covered Entities and Their Partners Need to Know Now

Since March 2010, increased growth in the 340B Program has been accompanied by increased scrutiny from state and federal governments and conflicts between various 340B Program stakeholders. A transition in U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) and Health Resources & Services Administration (HRSA) leadership may lead to changes in 340B Program policy, but the ongoing conflicts, particularly around contract pharmacies, will not likely be resolved quickly.

In this webinar, we discussed the current issues affecting 340B Program stakeholders, the tools (and their limitations) that may be employed by stakeholders and government agencies to resolve those issues, and what covered entities can expect in future developments affecting the 340B Program.

  1. Covered entities will likely be unable to resolve contract pharmacy issues quickly through either the current litigation or the ADR panels. While there are a number of pending cases related to the 340B Program, litigation can be inherently slow process. The Administrative Dispute Resolution (ADR) Final Rule that was published in December 2020 was recently enjoined and additional injunctions may follow. While HHS appears to be moving forward with operationalizing the ADR process, the ADR Panel members who would hear the disputes remain under review by the Biden Administration. If and when the ADR panels are finally implemented, decisions of those panels may be litigated too.
  2. Covered entities should review and monitor their state Medicaid program’s billing requirements for 340B drugs. State Medicaid programs must have a mechanism to identify 340B drugs when required to exclude them from [...]

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