For Gregg county employees, ‘specialty drug program’ lowers cost of life-saving medications

Longview News-Journal
By Samuel Shaw Report for America/Longview News-Journal
August 12, 2023

For years, Gregg County has offered employees with conditions such as cancer and diabetes a lifeline as rising prescription drug prices, especially for new treatments, became a national crisis.

And those savings are estimated to increase substantially this year after the county transitions to a new provider, International RX.

The service, previously run through Texas-based CerpassRX, circumvents pharmacy markups by sourcing drugs directly from the manufacturer, sometimes outside the United States.

Medications are sent by mail to workers who opt-in to the program. Basics of the service will remain the same with the new company, but costs will decrease for the county and its employees.

“This will save the county something to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars per year,” said Gregg County Judge Bill Stoudt. “We have some people on drugs that are (paying) $6,000 a month. So instead of paying $6,000, they might be able to get it for $900 If they go through the international program.”

Patients with diseases for which no generic drug treatment exists often have a second pill to swallow: eye-popping medication costs . Drug launch prices —the annual cost of a new medication at the time of release — increased from $5,000 in 2008 to more than $200,000 in 2022, according to PwC, an international business consultancy.

Despite being manufactured for more than a century, U.S. insulin prices average $100 a month, or seven times the cost of the next most expensive nation.

After Monday's commissioners meeting where a pre-funding payment to International RX was approved, Stoudt highlighted insulin as a core concern and why the specialty drug program is important.

“I mean look at insulin prices. The costs are just crazy,” Stoudt said.

Kelli Davis, a senior purchasing officer with the county, said even small price hikes can have an effect on workers, 80% of which she estimates are living paycheck to paycheck.

However, Davis and Stoudt strongly encourage employees and residents to support local pharmacies for routine, small-ticket purchases.

The “specialty drugs program,” as Davis has taken to calling the service, is for medications that are essential and sometimes as expensive as homes. In those cases, Stoudt said, “some local pharmacies just can't meet the discount that some of these big pharmaceutical companies can.”