Right Prescription for Seniors Act of 2004

Bill: 108-s-2487
Sponsor: Sen. Dayton, Mark [D-MN]
Introduced: 2004-06-02 in the Senate
Policy area: Health
Subjects: Access to health care
Administrative procedure
Business records
Commerce
Congress
Congressional reporting requirements
Cost control
Cost of living adjustments
Department of Health and Human Services
Drug industry
Drugs
Finance and Financial Sector
Foreign Trade and International Finance
Government Operations and Politics
Government contractors
Government employees' health insurance
Government paperwork
Government procurement
Governmental investigations
Health insurance
Health maintenance organizations
Identification devices
Imports
Insurance premiums
Intellectual property
Labeling
Law
Managed care
Medical economics
Medicare
Members of Congress
Pharmacies
Pharmacists
Prescription pricing
Product counterfeiting
Product safety
Quality of care
Quality of products
Social Welfare
Wholesale trade

Summary:
action_date: 2004-06-02
text: 
Right Prescription for Seniors Act of 2004 - Amends title XVIII (Medicare) of the Social Security Act, as amended by the Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement, and Modernization Act of 2003, to ensure that Medicare beneficiaries have access to a Medicare administered prescription drug plan option. 
 
Repeals provisions prohibiting the Secretary from interfering with the negotiations between drug manufacturers and pharmacies and prescription drug plan sponsors and from requiring a particular formulary or instituting a price structure for the reimbursement of covered part D drugs. 
 
Grants the Secretary the authority similar to that of other Federal entities that purchase prescription drugs in bulk to negotiate contracts with manufacturers of covered part D drugs, consistent with the requirements and in furtherance of the goals of providing quality care and containing costs. Requires the Secretary to use such authority to negotiate the prices of such drugs under prescription drug plans offered by PDP sponsors. 
 
Amends the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act to direct the Secretary to promulgate regulations allowing qualifying individuals to import covered products (in addition to pharmacists and wholesalers, whom current law authorizes to import such products).
 
States that the Secretary shall not have to store records in cases in which qualifying individuals have imported a covered product.
 
Amends provisions regarding the importation of covered products, repealing the mandate that the Secretary require that a foreign seller specify the original source of the product and the amount of each lot of the product originally received. 
 
Amends provisions regarding the testing of imported covered products. Declares that specified tests, including ones involving authenticity and degradation of products, shall not be required unless the importer is a wholesaler. Requires such tests to be conducted by the importer unless a product is a prescription drug subject to requirements for counterfeit-resistant packaging. (Currently either the importer or the manufacturer may conduct such tests). 
 
Eliminates the sunset date current law establishes for the provisions pertaining to the importation of covered products (thus making such provisions permanent). 
 
Limits prescription drug benefits for Members of Congress.


Legislative actions:
action_date: 2004-06-02
text: Read twice and referred to the Committee on Finance.
action_date: 2004-06-02
text: Introduced in Senate