On Election Day, voters in California rejected a ballot proposition initiated by the California-based AIDS Health Care Foundation on drug pricing that is similar to one that is likely to appear on the Ohio general election ballot in 2017. Both the Ohio and California initiated statutes would prohibit the state from agreeing to pay, directly or indirectly, for the purchase of a prescribed drug unless the net cost of the drug, inclusive of rebate discounts and other price concessions, is the same as or less than the lowest price paid for the same drug by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.
Opponents to the measure in California painted the proposition as a seriously flawed measure that was poorly drafted and impossible to implement. Opponents to the Ohio Drug Price Relief Act have made the same arguments against the initiated statute proposed for Ohio. A Vorys Health Care Advisors analysis of the proposed Ohio initiated statute concludes that it is unlikely that the statute could be implemented; that the statute would create additional administrative burdens without much cost savings; and that additional, unintended consequences would likely occur in programs that became involved indirectly as collateral damage.
The Ohio Academy of Family Physicians has not taken a position on the Ohio Drug Price Relief Act.