The Independent Pharmacists’ Lobby Has Lost Its Mind

The group is pushing legislators to mandate a $10.24 tax on prescriptions in NC, payable directly to pharmacists

Bill was written by a pharmacist who received his campaign contributions…from pharmacists!

The typical “independent pharmacist” brand used to be the kindly old gentleman at the corner store down the street waving to kids and handing out lollipops.

Those days are long gone.

Instead, the lobbying campaign for independent pharmacists in North Carolina has taken to heckling legislators at parades and launching reckless accusations of corruption against anybody who opposes their crazy push to mandate a “pharmacist tax” on scripts filled in North Carolina.

Here’s the background.

North Carolina has the highest health care costs in the entire country. The bill pushed by independent pharmacists, House Bill 246, would make it even worse. There are a lot of in-the-weeds issues with the bill, but the top two issues are straight-forward.

First, via some crafty language, the bill would impose a $10.24 tax on just about every prescription filled in this state. Those hit most directly by the tax will be employers who self-fund their employee health insurance plans, but everyone will feel the pain.

Adding insult to injury, the extra money from the $10.24 tax will go straight to pharmacists. It’s a government mandate to transfer money from employers to pharmacists – exactly the wrong policy to impose at any time, but especially when North Carolina already has sky-high health costs.

Second, the bill tries – also by government mandate – to funnel foot traffic to pharmacies. It does so by effectively banning mail-order prescription delivery. If the bill becomes law, it would impose government mandates that jack up the cost of mail-order prescriptions such that they might become financially infeasible.

A reasonable person might conclude independent pharmacists want to do away with mail-order delivery so more people have to come into the pharmacy to pick up their meds, and maybe they’ll buy a coke and a bag of chips on their way out the door (if they have any money left over after paying the $10.24 pharmacist tax).

It’s yet another bad example of an industry looking to government to force behavior changes that enrich that industry. The people it harms are the elderly and terminally ill who rely on mail-order prescription delivery.

One doesn’t need to connect many dots to see the protectionism at play. This gambit to enrich independent pharmacists is sponsored by an independent pharmacist:

The independent pharmacist lobby and Sasser, who is retiring this year, have launched a grievance campaign against legislators who (rightfully) question the bill and its $10.24 pharmacist tax.

Sasser even lobbed a reckless corruption allegation recently, claiming campaign “‘dollars and cents’ are at fault for the stall out of his bill in the Senate.”

He apparently didn’t think it worth mentioning that his legislative career has been bankrolled by campaign cash from the independent pharmacist industry.

Independent pharmacists have also taken to heckling legislators at public appearances, including one at a Fourth of July parade.

The proper response to these unsavory tactics is to shut the door on House Bill 246. Aside from rewarding atrocious behavior, it would raise health costs on already-overburdened employers and effectively kill mail-order prescription delivery, all to benefit the very industry in which the bill sponsor made his career.