Sign The Petition
The 340B Drug Discount Program helps communities thrive. A small program with BIG benefits, 340B supports better health outcomes for patients all over the country. We ask that you SIGN our PETITION to Policy-Makers asking them to work with CV340B to protect the 340B program.
Policy-Makers,
We, the undersigned, strongly urge you to protect the 340B program. We understand that certain groups have attempted to shrink or diminish the success of the program for their own financial interests. We stand together as patient and community leaders, the true beneficiaries of the 340B program, to ask you to protect this program for the patients and communities it serves.
CV340B Sign-On Letter to HHS
Secretary Becerra and Acting Administrator Espinosa,
We write today to thank you for your strong leadership and decisive action in supporting the 340B program as evidenced by your public statements, letters to manufacturers, and response to recent litigation. With this letter, we hope to encourage you to keep fighting to protect the 340B program.
The undersigned individuals are grassroots advocates for the 340B drug pricing program who work with Community Voices for 340B (CV340B) to educate the public about this vital federal program. CV340B is a not-for-profit organization that:
– educates elected officials, business representatives, civic groups, faith-based organizations, health care workers, patient advocates and other community leaders about the value of the 340B program;
– documents the specific ways that the 340B program enables safety net providers to identify and meet the health care needs of their communities; and
– communicates and elevates the vital successes of the 340B program with state and local leaders, national allies, and health care policymakers.
As you know, the 340B program requires pharmaceutical manufacturers to offer discounts on outpatient drugs to statutorily-defined public and private non-profit hospitals and clinics as a condition of Medicaid and Medicare Part B covering and paying for such drugs. The savings and revenue that safety net providers receive through the program enable them to meet the unique needs of their communities, for example, by staffing disease-specific outreach programs, furnishing medication adherence services, paying for free care clinics, offering transportation and housing services, waiving or lowering drug co-payments, establishing COVID vaccine clinics, or assisting patients in overcoming barriers to care in other ways, all at no cost to taxpayers.
We are deeply concerned that certain manufacturers have unilaterally limited their participation in the 340B program by refusing to honor their pricing obligations on drugs dispensed by contract pharmacies except under narrow circumstances. Specifically, we applaud you for the following,
– the enforcement letters that HRSA sent in May directing the companies to reverse their policies immediately and to repay the discounts unlawfully withheld or face civil monetary penalties for their non-compliant practices;
– the strong defense of the program that the federal government has mobilized in response to the manufacturers’ lawsuits challenging the May 2020 cease-and-desist letters; and
– your unwavering support for the 340B program as expressed during recent Congressional testimony.
By these actions, it is clear to us that you understand that the 340B program is vital to the fiscal viability of safety net providers in the U.S. and that you appreciate the role safety net providers play in meeting the needs of underserved populations. Please know that we stand with you in your efforts to protect this important public health program.
Faith-Based Sign On Letter
Open letter from Faith-based leaders to state and federal policy-makers
We, the undersigned faith-based leaders, join as one to ask federal and state policymakers to protect front-line, safety net health care providers in our communities through support of the federal 340B Drug Pricing program. We know that the 340B program plays an incredibly important role in public health and we are asking you to vigorously defend it for those we serve.
Many of us face not only the overwhelming tragedy of the COVID pandemic but also ever-increasing costs of medications, startling inequities in access to care, and what could be irreversible damage to vulnerable populations most often in black and brown communities.
340B is working for our communities and for communities across the country. The program offers a lifeline to the neediest and most underserved patients by requiring pharmaceutical companies to provide drugs at discounted prices to safety net hospitals and clinics.
At possibly one the most difficult times we are facing as a nation, some drug manufacturers, insurers and benefit managers, and even some states are attacking the 340B program. Some are rewriting the rules to deplete the program’s benefit to our communities. Others are simply pocketing the benefit for themselves.
Our safety net providers use 340B savings to underwrite the cost of serving our patients. They use those savings to reinvest back into our communities, meaning they can do more with their limited dollars to serve our communities. All of this is made possible by a small but mighty program that affects just two percent of all drug sales in the United States – all without taxpayer expense.
We simply cannot sit on the sidelines and allow our safety net providers to stand alone in these battles. We are of many creeds, faiths, and denominations. We serve people from different races and ethnicities. We stand unified in one defining mission – to protect those we serve. Will you stand with us to protect the 340B program?
Others Ways to Get Involved
By joining forces our voices are amplified! Together we can #protect340B and the big impact it has on our communities. This little program needs our help. Some would like to see it dismantled in the name of corporate profit. Let policy makers (legislators, government officials etc.) know that the 340B Drug Discount Program helps your community thrive, sign our petition now!
Sample email to member of Congress
Subject line:
The 340B program helps our community
Message body:
I’m writing because I’ve learned about the important role that the federal 340B drug discount program plays in supporting public health in our community, and I wanted to be sure you knew, too. First established in 1992 through bipartisan legislation, the federal 340B drug discount program offers a lifeline to the neediest and most underserved patients by requiring pharmaceutical companies to provide drugs at a discounted price to safety net hospitals and clinics like _____________ right here in our community. In turn, _______________ uses its 340B savings to underwrite the cost of serving patients in our community. In fact, that reinvestment in patients and communities is what has made the 340B program so successful. 340B providers can do more with their limited dollars to benefit the communities that they serve. All this is made possible by a program that affects just two percent of all drug sales in the United States, and all without taxpayer expense.
Having learned about this important program, I wanted you to know how important I think it is that hospitals and clinics continue to be allowed to benefit from this program without additional burdens. 340B is a program that is working for us here in our community and for other communities across the country.
.
Sample letter to the editor (137 words):
To the editor:
With all the recent discussion about rising drug prices, a little-known federal drug pricing program has quietly been working for over 25 years to help our community and communities like ours around the country. The 340B drug discount program, which requires drug companies to provide drugs at a discounted price to safety net hospitals and clinics like __________ here in ____________ who serve the most vulnerable, has enjoyed bipartisan support and, best of all, does not come at taxpayer expense. Some in the drug industry have targeted 340B with exaggerated accusations to distract people from the real causes of rising drug prices—the drug companies themselves. As our lawmakers consider ways to address the high price of drugs for Americans, they would do well to let 340B continue to work for us here in __________ and elsewhere.
Signed,
[name]
[address]
Twitter:
- Follow @CV340B, @340BHealth, @Let340B, @340BMatters, @340BFacts, @340BCoalition, @RWC340B
- Retweet and reply to messages that resonate to you. Feel free to @ those messages to your member of Congress!
- Looking for a simple message to tweet? Try something like this:
The 340B drug discount program helps safety net hospitals and clinics provide more comprehensive healthcare to the most needy without taxpayers having to pay for it. You can learn more about this important program, too, by following @CV340B. Our community #thriveswith340B.
Facebook:
Like and follow CV340B!
Hosting a 340B event:
- Work with your local CV340B rep to invite representatives from your local 340B covered entities to come to your home to meet members of the community interested in learning more about and supporting their work.
- Invite friends to your house to meet with the representative from CV340B and your local covered entity representatives.
- Print handout materials from CV340B website.
- Set up light refreshments.
- Put out information from CV340B on how your friends can help spread the word about this important program (sample emails, sample letters to the editor, social media).
- Ask guests to take some of these steps, and who would be willing to learn more.
- Work with your local CV340B representative on how to expand this conversation to others.