Post by Logan on Apr 17, 2016 8:37:29 GMT -6
In a skirmish in what could become a battle over employee health care costs, Bergen County leaders have advised their employees that they will no longer pay for many expensive compound medications.
The presidents of the county’s two largest unions issued a joint press release Friday, the effective date of the cutoff, calling the “unilateral” action by the county a violation of the collective-bargaining process and saying it will jeopardize the health of workers and their families.
But County Administrator Dominic Novelli said that the unions were well aware of the administration’s concern over spiraling health-care costs. He added that prescriptions were a major driver of that increase and that costs for the compound medications — drugs specifically tailored by a pharmacist for a particular patient —were in and of themselves a fiscal emergency that had to be stopped before they drained the budget further.
“We had to take what I would consider emergency action to stop the hemorrhaging,” Novelli said. “We’d have no other option other than to eliminate positions.”
Read more: www.northjersey.com/news/bergen-county-cuts-health-coverage-for-workers-1.1546574
The presidents of the county’s two largest unions issued a joint press release Friday, the effective date of the cutoff, calling the “unilateral” action by the county a violation of the collective-bargaining process and saying it will jeopardize the health of workers and their families.
But County Administrator Dominic Novelli said that the unions were well aware of the administration’s concern over spiraling health-care costs. He added that prescriptions were a major driver of that increase and that costs for the compound medications — drugs specifically tailored by a pharmacist for a particular patient —were in and of themselves a fiscal emergency that had to be stopped before they drained the budget further.
“We had to take what I would consider emergency action to stop the hemorrhaging,” Novelli said. “We’d have no other option other than to eliminate positions.”
Read more: www.northjersey.com/news/bergen-county-cuts-health-coverage-for-workers-1.1546574