The Obama administration has launched a probe into whether health-care providers such as dialysis centers are steering patients eligible for Medicare and Medicaid benefits into insurance plans offered on the health law’s exchanges.

Medicare spending on prescriptions increased more than 17% in 2014, despite a claims increase of only about 3%, according to data released Thursday.

The Obama administration is moving to end duplicate coverage for tens of thousands of people who are enrolled in Medicaid and simultaneously receiving federal subsidies to help pay for private health insurance under the Affordable Care Act.

The “most important factor” that drives prescription drug prices higher in the United States than anywhere else in the world is the existence of government-protected “monopoly” rights for drug manufacturers, researchers at Harvard Medical School report today.

As evidence mounts that rates for health plans sold on public exchanges are rising higher than expected and causing large insurers to cut and run from this marketplace, brokers and advisers can glean useful information from these developments.

Pharmaceutical companies have contributed more than $16 million this month to oppose a ballot measure that aims to limit the price the state pays for prescription drugs.