Bill Description: House Bill 291 would establish government standards for how pharmacy benefit managers should conduct pharmacy audits. 

Rating: -1

NOTE: House Bill 291 is similar to House Bill 270, introduced earlier this session.

Does it give government any new, additional, or expanded power to prohibit, restrict, or regulate activities in the free market? Conversely, does it eliminate or reduce government intervention in the market?

House Bill 291 would create Chapter 66, Title 41, Idaho Code, titled the "Fair Pharmacy Audits Act" to regulate how pharmacy benefit managers handle and conduct audits of pharmacies.

This chapter would not apply to any "specific type of audit" provided for "in federal or state law, rule, or procedure" or to "a financial examination conducted by a certified public accountant according to generally accepted auditing standards."

This law also would not apply to audits related to Medicaid payments, even though pharmaceutical expenditures for Idaho's Medicaid recipients exceeded $500 million for Fiscal Year 2022. This bill isn't about providing greater accountability for expenditures of taxpayer dollars.

Instead, this law is about overriding the private contracts that exist between pharmacies and pharmacy benefit managers. 

There is no need for government to control or micromanage a business relationship or related process that is part of a contractual relationship between or among private entities acting within the market. 

(-1)