This one even beats the $4 generic Wally World special!

Posted on Thu, Jun. 19, 2008, Philly.com

Blue Cross offers no-co-pay plans for generic drugs

By Stacey Burling
Inquirer Staff Writer

To encourage the biggest users of medical care to take cheaper medicines and stay on them, Independence Blue Cross will waive co-pays for 75 generic drugs used to treat chronic conditions, the insurer said yesterday. The program, called Rx for Better Health, will be in effect from July 1 through Dec. 31 for IBC and AmeriHealth of Pennsylvania subscribers. It will not apply to people who have Medicare Part D, Medicare discount cards, and members of the Federal Employees Health Benefits program and AmeriHealth of New Jersey or Delaware.

The new initiative is a follow-up to last year's broader No Pay Copay program, which waived $50 million worth of co-pays for all generics. The company credits that program, which stopped at the end of 2007, with increasing generic use from 47 percent to 62 percent of prescriptions filled.

IBC began offering employers plans with zero co-pays this year. Rx for Better Health likely will waive about $12 million in co-pays.

Paul Urick, senior vice president of FutureScripts L.L.C., a for-profit IBC affiliate that is administering the new program, said he believed the new effort would drive even more customers to try generics and save everyone money.

In typical plans, subscribers pay higher co-pays for brand-name drugs - $20 to $35 - than for generics - $10.

Together, IBC and subscribers pay $25 to $40 for a month's supply of a generic medicine. Brand-name drugs average $150 to $170, Urick said. With that kind of price differential, the insurer and its customers - employers who provide insurance - can save money even if the generic co-pay is dropped.

Getting people with chronic illnesses to stay on their medications is a continuing problem. While cost is only one reason that patients stop, anything that helps keep them taking their medicines is likely to also help reduce more serious medical problems and worker absenteeism, Urick said.

The new program applies to more than 200,000 subscribers with high blood pressure, high cholesterol, diabetes, depression, acid reflux, heart failure and heart disease.

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Simvastatin and sertraline are among the generics for which co-pays would be waived. View an explanation of the drug program and the full list of generics at http://go.philly.com/generic19

From John Curry