CMS releases the next round of prescription drugs for Medicare price negotiations, including Ozempic

The news: After revealing the final prices of the first 10 prescription drugs negotiated under then President Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) in August 2024, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) just released the next round of prescription drugs selected for deliberation.

There are 15 drugs on the list including GLP-1s Ozempic, Wegovy, and Rybelsus. The list’s release marks the first step in a negotiation process between Medicare and drugmakers that is expected to occur over the coming months.

Negotiated prices wouldn’t take effect until 2027. The selected medications accounted for about $41 billion in total gross covered prescription drug costs under Medicare Part D between November 2023 and October 2024, according to the CMS.

Zooming in: The Trump administration has remained mum on whether it supports the process.

Drugmakers attest that the price talks stifle innovation. Eli Lilly and other pharma companies plan to ask the Trump administration to delay this round of Medicare drug price negotiations. Meanwhile, industry trade group PhRMA lambasted the list’s release, arguing that the negotiations do nothing to “rein in abuses by insurance companies and pharmacy benefit managers who ultimately decide how much a patient pays at the pharmacy counter.”

Yes, but: The public has very different views on the drug price negotiation component of the IRA.

• 55% of US adults indicate that “expanding the number of prescription drugs that the federal government negotiates the price on for Medicare beneficiaries” should be a top priority for Congress or the Trump administration, according to KFF.

Even members of the president’s own party agree. Some 48% of Republicans believe that broader Medicare drug price negotiations should be at or near the top of the new administration’s priority list, per KFF.

Our take: We don’t expect a repeal of the IRA’s negotiation program, which right-wing blueprint Project 2025 calls for.

But we wouldn’t be surprised to see Trump amend the process in drugmakers’ favor, which could include exempting certain drugs from future lists or not accelerating the program as quickly as a Harris-led administration would have. This would both appease pharma companies while simultaneously projecting the appearance that he’s not succumbing to their whims. And doing so could also help the administration save face in the eyes of consumers by not repealing the popular program outright.

The future of the drug price negotiations program isn’t the only drug policy development Trump will have to consider. A separate proposal introduced by Biden late last year that would require Medicare and Medicaid to cover GLP-1s for weight loss still needs to be decided on. The Trump administration’s decision on the fate of the negotiation program or proposal—whichever comes first—will give us an indication as to the likely future of the other.

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