AARP has weighed in as the 800-pound gorilla in Virginia’s drug pricing debate, lending its weight to a so-called Prescription Drug Affordability Board (PDAB) that would be empowered to impose price controls on medicines. But it’s crucial for legislators and the governor to understand that AARP advocates not on behalf of seniors but rather on behalf of its corporate partner and principal funding source — UnitedHealth.
AARP’s own survey research shows that insurance-related costs such as premiums, deductibles, and copays are voters’ top health care cost concerns (74%), but AARP’s advocacy focuses almost exclusively on prescription drug costs. The organization touts President Joe Biden’s so-called Inflation Reduction Act — which empowers the secretary of Health and Human Services to impose price controls on 10 drugs — as a great success, even though recent polling on older Americans found 83% believe the IRA has not directly helped them in terms of lowering prescription drug prices, and 77% view the IRA as a failure a year after its passage.