High-deductibles pose another problem

The world of prescription drug distribution can be complicated and confusing. Bloomberg reported on an interesting angle: the world of large manufacturer rebates may be coming up against the world of high deductibles. For historical reasons, many pharmaceutical manufacturers end up pricing their product expensively, but offering a significant rebate to offset some of that cost. As long as the insurer was paying for the medications, it made sense that the insurers would also receive the rebates. However, as deductibles have risen, more patients are paying full-price for their prescriptions, and the distribution system is not set up to send the rebates to the people who actually paid, but rather the traditional recipients, the insurers. The result certainly seems incorrect, but I can also see how the solution would be non-trivial.

The healthcare industry has had decades of assuming a third-party payer, and now that patients are increasingly responsible for a significant portion of their own costs, the industry finds itself needing to course-correct.