Opinion
A4
Saturday, November 20, 2021
OUR VIEW
Travel safely
during this
holiday season
he Thanksgiving holiday is just around
the corner, and experts are projecting that
travel will climb to pre-pandemic levels.
That’s good news in many ways, but it also
presents a familiar problem that dissipated
during the pandemic — traffi c accidents.
The American Automobile Association pre-
dicts that more than 53 million people will
travel for the Thanksgiving holiday, a 13%
increase from 2020. In fact, the boost in travel
is expected to the biggest single-year increase
since 2005.
That means there will be a lot of traffi c on the
roads and highways, and it also means motor-
ists will need to be cautious and attentive.
No one sets out on a holiday trip to get into
a serious car crash. We pack our things, get
everyone in the vehicle and ready to go then
head down the highway with high expectations
to meet family and friends.
Yet every year during Thanksgiving — or
Christmas or other major holidays, such as the
Memorial Day weekend — serious or deadly
crashes happen.
The reasons run the gamut from bad luck to
carelessness, but no matter the cause, the hol-
iday often turns into a tragedy.
Accidents don’t have to happen, though.
Drivers can avert such disasters by completing
a few simple tasks, and topping the list are
being prepared and paying attention.
Sure, a driver doesn’t have any control over
someone else behind the wheel, but we can all
take measures to lessen the chance of a terrible
ending to a holiday weekend.
That means getting plenty of sleep before
you hit the road, and, if the journey is a long
one, taking turns driving. Tired drivers are
apt to make poor judgments or have slow reac-
tion times. Eight hours of good sleep is a small
price to pay and one of the best ways to prevent
traffi c crashes.
While crashes during high-traffi c holidays
seem to be inevitable, they are not. Driving
defensively, paying close attention and sharing
driving duties are easy and simple ways to get
where you’re going, and home again, safely.
The Thanksgiving and Christmas travel
season should be one of joy and anticipation.
Neither holiday should include a list of fatalities
on the roadways.
Everyone wants to have a great time during
the holidays. Those of us who will travel to visit
our relatives and our friends need to do what we
can to make sure we arrive safely.
T
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Pharmacy closures causing troubles
RON
WYDEN
OTHER VIEWS
ural Oregonians have long
counted on local pharmacies
deeply rooted in their com-
munities for quality service.
But those community mainstays
now face a growing threat from an
unfair practice by big insurance
companies and pharmaceutical ben-
efi t managers (PBMs) that’s threat-
ening the pharmacies’ ability to stay
open.
And that threat, in turn, under-
mines rural Oregonians’ access to
prescription drugs, patient educa-
tion, management of chronic dis-
ease, preventative care and life-
saving vaccines.
In recent weeks, the fallout from
the announcement by Bi-Mart that
it’s begun closing 37 pharmacies in
our state — in part because of that
unfair practice — has cast troubling
ripples throughout Eastern and Cen-
tral Oregon.
News reports have detailed how
Umatilla County Public Health has
raised concerns about diminished
capacity to off er COVID-19 vac-
cination clinics with fewer local
pharmacies; Baker County health
offi cials referred to a local “phar-
macy health crisis” with longer wait
times to get prescriptions fi lled at
remaining pharmacies and a lack
of critical infrastructure for people
seeking fl u shots and COVID-19
boosters; and there are longer wait
R
times as well in Central Oregon
with Bi-Mart closing its pharmacy
services in Sisters. And I heard sim-
ilar problems fi rsthand last week
from pharmacies in Ashland and
Corvallis.
This is not a minor inconve-
nience in rural Oregon when fam-
ilies and seniors must drive longer
distances for prescriptions and other
pharmacy services, especially over
snow- and ice-covered roads in the
upcoming winter months.
Here’s what’s going on, and what
I’m doing as chair of the Senate
Finance Committee to get relief for
rural Oregonians who deserve reli-
able and accessible pharmacies in
their communities.
Goliaths like Big Insurance and
the PBMs put the squeeze on small
pharmacies by charging them some-
thing called a DIR fee. That stands
for direct and indirect remuneration
fees, and PBMs demand that phar-
macies pay up, or they’ll take their
business elsewhere.
To be sure, DIR fees are not
likely to come up in conversation
around too many dinner tables this
Thanksgiving. But they’re a big deal
because they skyrocketed 91,500%
from 2010 to 2019, and doubled
from 2018 to 2020. They contributed
to the permanent closure of 2,200
pharmacies nationwide between
December 2017 and December
2020.
Why do PBMs charge these fees?
In short, because they can. This dis-
turbing development should sound
loud alarm bells, because PBMs
CONTACT YOUR REPRESENTATIVES
U.S. PRESIDENT
Joe Biden
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Ave. NW
Washington, DC 20500
Comments: 202-456-1111
U.S. SENATORS
Ron Wyden
221 Dirksen Senate Offi ce Bldg.
Washington, DC 20510
202-224-5244
La Grande offi ce: 541-962-7691
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can use mechanisms like DIR fees
deliberately, to starve independent
pharmacies of revenue. When these
stores close, large chain pharmacies
owned by the same plans and PBMs
that forced them to pay up, reap the
benefi ts. These fees are unfair and
they’re anti-free enterprise.
I’ve asked the Center for Medi-
care and Medicaid Services (CMS)
to use its existing legal authority to
propose and fi nalize rules that make
it impossible for PBMs to use DIR
fees to force community pharmacies
to close their doors.
In my recent letter to CMS
Administrator Chiquita Brooks-La-
sure, I noted that Bi-Mart’s
announcement of the 37 pharmacy
closures in Oregon and 19 others
in the Northwest cited “increasing
costs and ongoing reimbursement
pressure.”
I wrote, “These fees do nothing
to lower the amount Medicare ben-
efi ciaries must pay for their drugs
each time they fi ll a prescription and
seemingly serve only to pad plan
and PBM profi ts.”
Bottom line: The use of DIR fees
is unfair and unjustly enriches big
insurers and PBMs.
For the benefi t of Oregonians in
small communities throughout our
state, I’m all in to preserve their life-
lines to local Oregon pharmacies and
knock these “Goliaths” down a peg
or two so that local rural pharmacies
can continue to stay open.
———
Ron Wyden is a Democratic
senator from Oregon.
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