While breakthrough medications offer tremendous clinical benefits for patients, the prices charged for prescription drugs is a major threat to keeping health care affordable for Massachusetts employers and consumers and a major factor in rising health care costs year after year. Exorbitant increases in prescription drug prices have been consistent across all segments of the pharmaceutical industry – specialty, brand-name and generics, and state reports have shown that spending on prescription drugs has significantly outpaced overall health care spending growth even after accounting for discounts and rebates.
