Employee Benefits Division approves March 2025 formulary updates, adds Stelara biosimilars

Members of the Employee Benefits Division approved updates to the March 2025 pharmacy formulary and related medical drug recommendations, including adding biosimilars to Stelara that staff said are expected to take effect around June 1.

Grant Wallace, director of the Employee Benefits Division, told members the agenda item was a routine review and described the additions: “What you'll see on here is pretty much a normal, review, and movement of some of the medications. Things that I do wanna highlight are down at the bottom of the page, starting with Yaxentik and the next 3. Those are the biosimilars for Stelara that we are rolling on to our formulary.” He added, “So these would go into effect, 06/01 ish, if not a little bit sooner.”

Wallace said the packet also included a reclassification of a group of medications and that the medical-side recommendations mirrored some pharmacy-side changes because certain biologic therapies begin as IV infusions and then transition to outpatient pharmacy fills. “When you look at the Stelara, they start on the medical side with an IV infusion and then switch over to the pharmacy,” he said.

Members asked no substantive questions during the two agenda items. A meeting speaker stated, “Seeing no questions? We will see this item without objection reviewed and approved.” The two items were recorded in the transcript as reviewed and approved without objection; no roll-call vote or individual tallies were recorded in the transcript.

The updates are presented as cost-management moves by favoring lower-cost biosimilars over brand-name biologics; staff did not provide a dollar estimate for the formulary change in the provided discussion.

Both items were closed with no further public discussion recorded in the transcript.