AUSTIN — An updated study from the Berkeley Research Group (BRG) shows more than half (50.5%) of total spending on brand-name prescription drugs goes to middlemen like pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) and other stakeholders in the drug supply chain — not to drug manufacturers.“This study confirms that the companies that take the risk to develop these vital treatments are not driving medicine spending growth,” said Victoria Ford, President and CEO of the Texas Healthcare and Bioscience Institute (THBI). “The fact that middlemen, including PBMs, are driving up the cost that patients ultimately shoulder should serve as a wake-up call to ...