Breast cancer touches us all, but thanks to profiteering drug companies, breast cancer is also touching our wallets.
A recent New York Times article reported that the new, much-hyped cancer drug Abraxane performs similarly to an older drug called Taxol, but costs $4,200 a dose — 25-times more than the older drug.
Both of these drugs are meant to treat terminally ill breast cancer patients with no other options for fighting this aggressive disease. The Food and Drug Administration approved the use of Abraxane for the treatment of breast cancer in January 2005.
Abraxane developer Patrick Soon-Shoing contends studies prove the drug carries fewer side effects, and shrinks tumors more often, than Taxol. But the Times cites an independent cancer research journal that found the differences between the two drugs to be negligible.
Breast cancer killed 40,000 women in 2005. Another woman is diagnosed with the disease every two minutes, according to breastcancer.org. Drug companies have tapped into these statistics to prey on patients’ hope for a miracle drug and releasing more expensive versions of the same old medicines.
Insurance companies cover the costs of these medications, but allowing pharmaceutical companies to repackage old medicines and calling them revolutionary needlessly drives up insurance costs for everyone.
In fact, over the past five years the average annual increase in inflation has been 2.5 percent while health insurance premiums for small firms have escalated an average of 15 percent annually,” according to the National Coalition on Health Care.
Currently, the FDA only monitors the safety and usefulness of drugs, not their costs. So it has very little power to control pharmaceutical companies from charging outrageous prices for only slightly more effective drugs.
According to the Times, drug companies cannot deny coverage on cancer treatments based on the price. “Medicare, which pays for Abraxane, is also forbidden by law from considering cost in deciding what treatment to cover.”
It seems an unhealthy relationship exists between drug companies, doctors and the FDA.
Doctors, in an effort to provide the most effective and care to their patients, prescribe the costly medicines. Insurance companies must pay the costs for these new drugs and the FDA can do nothing to monitor the price-gouging.
The FDA may need to monitor the economics behind new drugs. While it cannot control drug costs, it should educate patients and doctors on the real costs and benefits of new drugs.
While we understand drug companies have a product to sell and have the right to sell it at whatever price they choose, they also have an ethical responsibility to patients to provide drugs that actually provide new and better treatments.
It seems only a concerted effort between insurance companies, doctors and the FDA can check ballooning insurance costs.
Insurance companies must work more closely with the FDA and doctors to decide which treatments are best for patients, especially if drug companies insist that their recycled drugs provide new medical breakthroughs.