Well, Rite Aid store closures are continuing to pile up as the pharmaceutical chain files for a second bankruptcy.

A group of lawmakers and independent pharmacists today are calling attention to Rite Aid financial troubles not as a corporate event, but what they say is a public health crisis in the making.

Ted Goldberg reports.

As part of our ongoing series Under the Dome exploring state government and the impact it has on the people who live here.

We are on the precipice of a impending public health emergency in Jersey residents.

We don't want that to happen.

A pharmacy call it a random gust of wind or an ill omen for New Jersey's pharmacies.

More of them are closing statewide, creating pharmacy deserts.

And some are blaming the cost of doing business on pharmacy benefit managers or PBMs.

In PBM dealings with independent pharmacies.

There's no fairness, no accountability, and no negotiations.

It's their way or the highway.

A lot of the legislation that we have, whether at the state level or at the federal level, is targeted towards reforming their practices and making it more fair, because currently right now with PBMs, the contracts that are provided to pharmacies are take it or leave it.

We don't really have any say no, negotiate signs in the process and the rates are usually at or below cost.

PBMs act as middlemen in the drug supply chain and first developed as a way to streamline the industry.

At the time, back in.

Back in the seventies it was everything used to be pen to paper and you catalog everything.

So it was just a more computerized way at the time of being able to bill and submit claims to insurers for payment.

So at the time it was considered a more had an easier way to to make claims and get paid.

Brian Pinto has owned a pharmacy in Westfield for more than 20 years and he says PBMs force him to sell most of his medication at cost or at a loss.

There used to be the the well-known tendency that generics used to pay better, that there was a higher reimbursement on those.

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 at literally what it costs to get to get those products.

Pharmacists like Pinto joined lawmakers to speak outside of the state House today, raising awareness for the Patient and Provider Protection Act.

Among other things, it would require PBMs to have a fiduciary duty to the long term health outcomes of those who are covered.

And it would prohibit marketing with inaccurate or misleading information.

Instead of worrying about individuals, sometimes this is being managed by spreadsheets and and it shouldn't be.

Patients should not have to struggle to purchase life saving medications while the food industry is taking in millions in profits.

The Pharmaceutical Care Management Association represents PBMs in New Jersey and argues that this bill would actually make health care more expensive.

As part of a statement, they tell us the legislation that pharmacists are pushing would significantly increase health care costs in New Jersey in order to give drug companies and pharmacies higher profits.

The fact is, over 50% of the pharmacies in New Jersey are independent pharmacies.

And over the last decade, the number of independent pharmacies increased by over 14%.

These speakers weren't far from New Jersey's bankruptcy court, where Rite Aid is going through bankruptcy for a second time and closing stores statewide.

The truth is that something that happens to independent pharmacies all the time and that goes by without a word means that this isn't just about losing a storefront.

This is about losing patients access to care and their established, trusted relationship with community pharmacies.

So to help prevent pharmacy deserts, the Patient Provider Protection Act was introduced in October and passed out of committee in December.

Lawmakers held two hearings on PBMs this spring.

A vote on the assembly floor is not yet scheduled.

In Trenton, I'm Ted Goldberg.

NJ Spotlight News.

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A private corporation funded by the American people.