Washington Blade - July 25, 2003
Lou Chibbaro Jr.

In a 17-page legal protest filed July 14 before the city's Contract Appeals Board, the clinic accuses the D.C. Department of Health of engaging in "irregularities in the procurement process" in its handling of Whitman-Walker's bid.

On May 30, the DOH awarded the contract to Care Pharmacies, Inc., an Arlington-based franchise that has affiliated pharmacies in D.C., Northern Virginia, and suburban Maryland.

Janis Bolt, a spokesperson for the D.C. Office of Contracting & Procurement, said rules governing the city's contracting procedures prohibit the city from commenting on matters pending before the Contract Appeals Board.

Gerson Serody, Care Pharmacies' chief executive officer, did not return a call by press time. An employee with the firm's headquarters office in Crystal City, Va., said Serody was the only person authorized to comment on the D.C. pharmacy contract.

AIDS activists have expressed concern that the city has taken more than two years to award the contract. The contract is needed to put in place an innovative federal demonstration program allowing up to 285 low-income people with HIV in the District to become eligible for Medicaid. Normally, people with HIV are not eligible for Medicaid coverage until they become disabled, which, under Medicaid rules, means they must have full-blown AIDS.

AIDS advocacy groups have urged the federal government to revise its Medicaid rules to allow low-income people with HIV to receive Medicaid benefits. They argue that such benefits provide the comprehensive medical care needed to prevent people with HIV from progressing to AIDS, saving the government the expense of paying for costly AIDS treatments.

The federally funded AIDS Drug Assistance Program helps pay for life-saving drugs for people with HIV, but AIDS groups say Medicaid is preferable because it provides a wider range of medical services in addition to paying for prescription drugs.

The contract calls for a vendor to coordinate the "distribution and dispersal of anti-retroviral and other HIV-related medication services" through at least 14 neighborhood pharmacies, with at least one located in each of the city's eight wards. It requires all of the pharmacies to be certified by the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services to accept Medicaid patients.

In its announcement seeking bidders, the DOH said the contract would require a vendor to provide between 5,000 and 40,000 prescription renewals in the first year, with an expected reimbursement of $750,000.

The announcement said the contract would have a renewal clause of four additional years, with a maximum 40,000 prescriptions and a reimbursement of $750,000 for each year, bringing the total reimbursement over a five-year period to $3,750,000.

Whitman-Walker wants more options for patients

Michael Cover, Whitman-Walker's communications director, said the clinic has operated pharmacies in its D.C.-area clinics for more than 10 years and has extensive experience in dispensing state-of-the-art HIV drugs to its clients. He noted that the city announcement seeking bidders for the contract said the city could accept up to two vendors to carry out the contract.

"By choosing just one network, the city is limiting access to just 14 pharmacies," Cover said. "We would have added another 14."

In its bid for the contract, Whitman-Walker said it had organized a network of 14 pharmacies in locations throughout the city, including five CVS pharmacies.

The clinic's protest states that procurement officials unfairly lowered the clinic's score in a rating process on technical grounds and delayed informing the clinic about the alleged deficiencies. In announcing its request for bids for the contract, the city agreed to notify bidders of deficiencies in their proposals to enable them to make corrections.

The protest says that in April, after months without contacting the clinic, officials notified the clinic of "24 new technical deficiencies," which the clinic was required to respond to within four days. Cover said the clinic believes it corrected all of the issues the city labeled as deficiencies.

The clinic also alleges in the protest that the city appears to have stacked the bidding process in Care Pharmacies' favor by demanding that the bidders provide a pharmacy in each ward. The protest notes that Wards 7 and 8 have only a few pharmacies, making it "highly unlikely" that any vendor other than Care Pharmacies - which already lined up pharmacies in those wards - could find eligible alternative pharmacies in the two wards. The protest states that the city rejected Whitman-Walker's proposal to use a pharmacy located one block outside the Ward 8 boundary, which Ward 8 residents regularly use.

In a related issue, Cover said Whitman-Walker has objected to the city's decision to award Care Pharmacies a yearly "sole source" contract to supply drugs under the city's ADAP program. Care Pharmacies has received the sole source contract for nearly 10 years.

A sole source contract is issued without competitive bidding, based on the premise that a particular vendor is uniquely qualified to carry out the contract. It is also issued on an emergency basis, when the city determines there is not enough time to go through the competitive bidding process. In addition, it can be issued to certain vendors classified as "disadvantaged" businesses that merit favorable treatment to stimulate economic development.

Vera Jackson, a spokesperson for the DOH, said she was making inquiries to find out why Care Pharmacies has received the sole source ADAP contract, but Jackson did not respond by press time.

Cover said Whitman-Walker believes more than one vendor should be awarded ADAP pharmacy contracts. Under the present system, he said, Whitman-Walker is forbidden to dispense AIDS drugs to its ADAP patients from its own, on-site pharmacies.

MORE INFO

D.C. Dept. of Health

825 N. Capitol St., NE

Washington, D.C. 20002

dchealth.dc.gov

030725
WB030708

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