Billionaire entrepreneur Mark Cuban said he supports the Trump RX initiative, arguing that the program could significantly reduce prescription drug costs by bypassing pharmacy benefit managers and increasing price transparency, during an exchange with Sen. Tommy Tuberville.
Cuban said his company, Cost Plus Drugs, plans to work directly with Trump RX and provide real-time pricing information that would allow patients to benefit immediately when prices fall.
“We’ll work with Trump RX. I mean, it’s incredible. It’s stupendous. It’s like the most incredible program ever,” Cuban said.
“And so we’re excited to offer them our API so that they’ll be able to download our daily prices, so when they go down, everybody benefits.”
He said one of the biggest drivers of high prescription costs is the role played by pharmacy benefit managers, or PBMs, and argued that Trump RX’s use of a most-favored-nation approach would allow manufacturers to avoid those intermediaries.
“I like what they’re doing with the mfns, because, as I mentioned in my comments, our brand drugs are more expensive because PBMs are involved,” Cuban said.
“And with Trump RX and the MFN program that allows manufacturers to work around the PBMs and work directly to patients.”
Cuban said the result would be lower costs across the board, particularly for seniors.
“So I think it’ll save seniors. It’ll save everybody a lot of money,” he said.
While he acknowledged the plan would not fully fix the broader healthcare system, Cuban said it represents meaningful progress.
“I don’t think it solves the ultimate problem of how the system is designed. But I think it’s something that we obviously agree on, because that’s what cost plus drugs is. We publish our entire price list every day,” he said.
Tuberville pressed Cuban on how transparency plays a role in lowering costs, noting that Cost Plus Drugs publicly posts detailed pricing information.
“Your company post drug prices with full cost breakdowns. How does this transparency help save patients money?” Tuberville asked.
Cuban said transparency removes uncertainty for consumers and helps build confidence in the pricing model.
“I mean, you know, with cost plus drugs.com, any patient can just go look at their price for their medication, and so there’s no uncertainty,” Cuban said.
He added that showing the company’s limited markup is central to its approach.
“But more importantly, by seeing our markup of only 15% and seeing our costs, that builds trust.”
Cuban said trust is the core product in the prescription drug business and credited that philosophy for his company’s rapid growth.
“I always tell everybody in our company that what we really sell in this industry is trust, and so I think that’s what’s really allowed us to grow so quickly,” he said.
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