| Barry Gold 2006-10-18, 4:34 pm |
| daves <daves@re45t.be> wrote:
[snip]
>Nitrogen mustard, also known as Mustargen, was developed more than 60
>years ago and is among the oldest chemotherapy drugs. For decades, it
>has been blended into an ointment by pharmacists and used as a topical
>treatment for a cancer called cutaneous T-cell lymphoma, a rare form
>of cancer that mainly affects the skin.
>
>And once a company sets a price, government agencies, private
>insurers, and patients have little choice but to pay it. The Food &
>Drug Administration does not regulate prices, and Medicare is banned
>from considering price in deciding whether to cover treatments.
If the drug is over 60 years old, its patent has long since expired.
That means anybody who wants to can make it and compete with the
existing manufacturer.
So there is the choice that consumers have: buy it from another
manufacturer.
And Medicare requires that drug companies and pharmacies (and everybody
else) charge it no more than they charge consumers buying it for
themselves.
I suppose this is what happened to Mustargen. The drug company
decided that most people buying it are seniors on Medicare, so they
raised the retail price -- so they can charge Medicare more.
Meanwhile, the poor woman who was unfortunate enough to need it before
she turned 65 gets screwed. But if there are a reasonable number of
people who need the drug, you can bet somebody else will be
manufacturing it soon. "Orphan" drugs that only have a few hundred or
thousand potential customers are a different problem, though.
><snip>
>
>Many patients who rely on expensive drugs are stuck in a bind. Don
>Schare of Saratoga, Calif., said he paid $1,260 last month for 200
>grams of nitrogen mustard cream, about 10 times what he paid for his
>prior prescription. Mr. Schare, 69, said he was covered by the new
>Medicare Part D drug program as well as supplemental insurance from
>AARP, but that neither of his plans covered Mustargen.
>
>"It's an obscene gesture on the company's part to raise something by a
>factor of 10," Mr. Schare said.
>
>Jeffrey Malavasic, 58, a retired railroad worker in Florence, Ore.,
>said he had decided to fill only half of his Mustargen prescription
>when he learned of the price increase. He used the drug sparingly in
>the past and will be even more frugal, he said...
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