Linda Clark, Health Care Controversies Team leader, is quoted in Law360 in “High Court Gives States Green Light to Regulate PBMs” about the US Supreme Court decision in Rutledge v. Pharmaceutical Care Management Association upholding that states are permitted to regulate pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs). The ruling clarifies that PBMs can't use their ties with employee benefit plans to argue that only the federal Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) can regulate their business dealings.
“The fact you have a tangential relationship with entities that are regulated by ERISA doesn't make you completely immune from state regulation of anything you do," Linda said, adding that PBMs need to be regulated to prevent them from “employing even more draconian practices in management of their pharmacy networks.”