New regs for Wednesday: Pentagon creates prescription program

New regulations on healthcare, housing and halibut will be issued in the Federal Register on Wednesday.

Here’s a peek at what’s coming:

Healthcare:

The Defense Department is creating a five-year pilot program to require beneficiaries of its Tricare healthcare program to get prescription refills through a mail order program or at military treatment facilities.

The rule would apply to people on medication for chronic, long-term conditions that are taken on a recurring basis.

Also, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services is looking for public comments on when monetary penalties should be imposed for failing to comply with some reporting requirements when other programs have responsibilities for payments. 

Housing:

The Department of Housing and Urban Development is issuing “more definitive” standards for manually underwritten mortgage loans. 

The measure is one of three steps the Federal Housing Administration is planning to take to improve the soundness of the Mutual Mortgage Insurance Fund.

Additionally, the department is creating a definition for “qualified mortgages,” for which the Dodd-Frank financial reform law created new minimum standards.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has issued rules implementing the new requirements, but the housing department is also required to issue rules outlining which mortgages they oversee count as qualified mortgages. 

Chemicals:

The Environmental Protection Agency is setting tolerances for residues of the pesticides flonicamid and flutriafol on a range of agricultural products.

The agency is also declaring that the pesticide prohydrojasmon does not need a residue limit when it is used on apples or grapes ahead of harvest or as a plant growth regulator. 

Protected species:

An endangered type of flower known as the Indian Knob mountain balm should not be reclassified to lower its level of federal protections, according to the Fish and Wildlife Service. 

The service is also revising its proposal on new measures to protect the lesser prairie-chicken and reopening the public comment period. 

Another proposal will outline how some migratory birds in Alaska can be used for subsistence. 

Fishing:

The National Marine Fisheries Service is issuing rules to implement a plan for commercial Pacific halibut fishing. 

The agency is also implementing a cost recovery program for Pacific coast groundfish.