340B drug discount program gets new rules and patient protections
H.R. 9599 — SECURE 340B Act · Filed by Scott Peters (D-CA) · 7 cosponsors · Introduced Jul 6, 2026 · Referred to committee
Your members of Congress
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What it does
This bill makes the 340B drug discount program stricter. It sets clearer rules for who counts as a patient. It says which doctors can write prescriptions. It lets certain health centers give out cheap drugs if they sent the patient there. They must keep detailed records. The bill requires these places to show their patient help plans. It stops them from using harsh debt collection. It punishes drug makers who refuse to give discounts.
Who it affects
Low-income patients at health centers that serve poor people. These include federally qualified health centers, critical access hospitals, and sole community hospitals. The health centers themselves, which must follow new record-keeping and audit rules. Drug makers who sell to these programs.
One thing to notice
The bill helps some patients get cheap drugs through more places. But it puts big new paperwork and audit work on health centers, which might cost them more money.
From the analysis of the bill text, linked under Primary records below.
Where it stands
7 cosponsors: 4 Republicans, 3 Democrats.
- Jul 6, 2026 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in House”
- Jul 6, 2026 — Referred to House Committee on Education and Workforce and House Committee on Ways and Means · Congress.gov: “Referred to the Committee on Energy and Commerce, and in addition to the Committees on Ways and Means, and…”
Dates and quoted wording are Congress.gov's action record; the timeline shows status changes, not every procedural step.
Money around this bill
9 groups reported lobbying about this bill. They filed 9 reports from Jun 2026 to Jun 2026.
Those reports show $4,312,972 in lobbying spending. Each report lists about 16 bills. So that money was not all for this bill.
More groups named this bill than 89% of bills with any report.
Scott Peters, who sponsored the bill, received $1,174,750 from PACs for the 2026 election.
- Astrazeneca Pharmaceuticals Lp — $1,680,000 in 1 report
- Novartis — $1,410,000 in 1 report
- Planned Parenthood Federation of America Inc — $652,972 in 1 report
- 340b Health — $240,000 in 1 report
- University of Rochester — $220,000 in 1 report
Lobbying is legal. These reports show who lobbied about this bill, not what changed.
Words to know
- 340B drug discount program — A federal program that lets certain hospitals and health centers buy drugs at lower prices to help poor patients
- federally qualified health centers — Community health clinics that get federal money to serve poor and uninsured people
- audit — An official check to make sure rules are being followed and records are correct
- lobbying — Trying to influence lawmakers about a bill. Companies and groups pay people to do this.
- PACs — Groups that collect money and give it to candidates for office.
- sponsored — To sponsor a bill is to introduce it in Congress and put your name on it.
How this was measured
Analysis — Quorum's AI read the bill text published by Congress.gov (50,094 characters) on Sep 21, 2026. Section numbers in the findings refer to that text, linked below; transparency and hidden-provision scores are compared against the median of 14,522 analysed bills.
Status and sponsors — Congress.gov's bill record — actions, committee referrals and cosponsors — loaded nightly. The timeline shows status changes, not every procedural action.
Money — Senate Lobbying Disclosure Act filings whose specific-issue field names this bill for quarters ending Jun 2026 to Jun 2026. A filing's amount is reported whole beside the median number of bills a filing names; it is never divided across them. PAC receipts are FEC-reported contributions to the sponsor's candidate committee in the 2026 cycle.
As of — lobbying records through Jul 20, 2026 · page rendered 2026-09-22.
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