Groups drop DE medicaid lawsuit
Wednesday, August 26th, 2009
By: Stephanie Aldrich
saldrich@whyy.org
A deal has been worked out that keeps Happy Harrys/Walgreens pharmacies as a Medicaid prescription provider in Delaware.
The National Association of Chain Drug Stores and the National Community Pharmacists Association had filed a federal lawsuit challenging Delaware's rate cuts for Medicaid reimbursements for brand name prescription drugs. Delaware Health and Social Services reduced medicaid reimbursements in an effort to save the state $500,000.
As a result, Walgreens said it would no longer fill Medicaid prescriptions.
But with nearly half of Delaware's medicaid clients using Walgreens pharmacies, DHSS and Walgreens started negotiations and came to a new agreement that still saved the state money, and lessened the financial impact to pharmacies.
But the new deal was contingent on the trade groups dropping their lawsuit.
The new agreement said just that. In a statement the groups said, "As a result of reaching an agreement, the joint lawsuit filed by the associations is no longer necessary."
"This agreement gets the budget savings that taxpayers deserve," DHSS Secretary Rita Landgraff said. "The 160,000 Medicaid clients in Delaware will still be able to fill their prescriptions at any of the Happy Harry's/ Walgreens stores in Delaware, as well as other pharmacies that accept Medicaid prescriptions including Rite-Aid, ACME, Pathmark, Super G, Target plus independently owned pharmacies.