The Alliance of Safety-Net Hospitals has conveyed to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services its general support for the agency’s proposal for reimbursing participants in the federal section 340B prescription drug discount program for the lost payments they suffered when CMS reduced those payments – reductions that a federal court ruled were illegal.

ASH articulated this support in a formal comment letter to CMS in response to that agency’s proposal for remedying the payment cuts.

CMS has proposed reimbursing hospitals for their lost payments in a single lump-sum payment, most likely later this year.  ASH supports this aspect of the CMS proposal but asked the agency to pay interest on its payment shortfall and establish a process for appealing the amount CMS proposes paying 340B participants.

In its formal comment letter ASH also expressed opposition to CMS’s plan to recoup the sum it makes in 340B restoration payments with future Medicare payment cuts, arguing that the federal government should not require hospitals to pay for its own illegal actions.

Finally, ASH urged CMS to ensure that Medicare Advantage plans that imposed the same 340B payment cuts as the federal government be required to compensate qualified providers for those underpayments.

The 340B program provides discounts on prescription drugs administered on an outpatient basis to hospitals and other providers that serve especially high proportions of low-income and uninsured patients.  All ASH community safety-net hospitals participate in the 340B program and view it as an essential tool in serving their generally low-income communities.

Learn more from ASH’s formal comment letter to CMS in response to that agency’s proposal to remedy its years of 340B underpayments.