Major health care companies are calling on Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Chair Lina Khan and two of her fellow commissioners to recuse themselves from a case centering on how the companies price insulin.
Pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) CVS Caremark, Cigna’s Express Scripts, and UnitedHealth’s OptumRx filed motions on Oct. 8 in which they argued that commissioners Khan, Alvaro Bedoya, and Rebecca Slaughter had made statements demonstrating deep bias on the issue.
For example, ExpressScripts’ motion pointed to remarks in which Khan said PBMs demand rebates “may function as kickbacks that raise costs and limit access to affordable medicines.”
It also pointed to Khan writing an article in law school claiming that PBMs “keep drug prices high.”…