New Jersey lawmakers and industry leaders this week spoke out against the role that pharmacy benefit managers, or PBMs, are playing in the closures of independent pharmacies in the state and the creation of so-called “pharmacy deserts.”

“With PBMs, the contracts that are provided to pharmacies are take it or leave it,” said Brian Pinto, owner of Tiffany Natural Pharmacy in Westfield. “We don’t really have any say, no negotiations in the process, and the rates are usually at or below cost.”

Speaking at a press conference outside the State House on Monday, Pinto said the state needs tighter regulation over PBMs’ setting prices on pharmacies for the medication they sell.

“There used to be the well-known tendency that generics used to pay better, that there was a higher reimbursement on those,” said Pinto, president of state pharmacists association. “But even now, because these PBMs operate in the same market, they know what our costs are. They are buying from the same places that we’re buying from. So they’re paying us that literally what it costs to get to get those products.”

Pinto was joined by lawmakers and others advocating for tighter regulation.

“Instead of worrying about individuals, sometimes [health care] is being managed by spreadsheets, and it shouldn’t be,” said state Assemblyman Roy Freiman (D-Somerset).

Added state Sen. Linda Greenstein (D-Middlesex): “Patients should not have to struggle to purchase lifesaving medications while the PBM industry is taking in millions in profits.”

Lawmakers have proposed the Patient and Provider Protection Act that would provide more regulation for PBMs. An Assembly committee amended the bill without advancing it in December, and no action has been taken since.

This story is made possible in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, a private corporation funded by the American people.

Editor’s note: This story has been updated to reflect the status of bill A4953, the Patient and Provider Protection Act.