STATEMENT OF HDMA PRESIDENT AND CEO JOHN M. GRAY ON ENACTMENT OF HEALTHCARE REFORM

ARLINGTON, Va., March 23, 2010 – HDMA President and CEO John M. Gray issued the following statement on today’s enactment of comprehensive healthcare reform legislation:

"HDMA's distributor member companies are longtime champions of quality, access, and efficiency in healthcare. Since 1876, HDMA companies have facilitated patient access to lifesaving, life-enhancing healthcare products and services. When Congress embarked upon its effort to reform healthcare early last year, HDMA called for reform that would reflect four core principles: expanded access to healthcare coverage; promotion of innovation and new technologies; investment in improved quality, efficiency, and patient safety; and preservation of efficiencies in the healthcare system. We are pleased with the extent to which these principles were debated in the halls of Congress.

"There are no easy solutions to the challenges of providing access to healthcare for all Americans. There is, however, broad consensus that pharmaceuticals are an essential component of patient care. The reform legislation passed by Congress and signed by President Obama today maintains the central role of healthcare distributors in providing lifesaving and life-enhancing medicines and other healthcare products for patients when and where they are needed. The nation's primary healthcare distributors save Americans an estimated $32 billion per year and effectively deliver more than nine million products per day nationwide. Delivering high-quality medications and maintaining healthcare affordability is a nonpartisan solution — and it is one that HDMA member companies delivered yesterday, deliver today and will deliver tomorrow."

About HDMA
HDMA is the national association representing primary healthcare distributors, the vital link in the healthcare system. Each business day, HDMA member companies ensure that more than nine million prescription medicines and healthcare products are safely delivered to more than 165,000 pharmacies, hospitals, nursing homes, physician offices, clinics and others nationwide. HDMA and its members work daily to provide value and contain costs, saving the nation’s healthcare system an estimated $32 billion per year.