Medicare to pay for $93,000 prostate cancer drug

[Omaha Steve]

Source: AP

By MATTHEW PERRONE

WASHINGTON (AP) - Medicare officials said Wednesday that the program will pay the $93,000 cost of prostate cancer drug Provenge, an innovative therapy that typically gives men suffering from an incurable stage of the disease an extra four months to live.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid said the biotech drug made by Dendreon Corp. is a "reasonable and necessary" medicine. The decision ensures that millions of men would be able to afford the drug through the government-backed health care coverage. With government reimbursement, analysts estimate Provenge could rack up $1 billion in sales next year. The decision, which will be finalized by June 30, is important for Dendreon because most prostate cancer patients are 65 or older.

Medicare is legally prohibited from considering price when deciding whether to pay for a new treatment. The Food and Drug Administration approved Provenge last April and in most cases Medicare automatically covers drugs cleared by the agency. But Medicare's decision to review Provenge last year prompted outrage from some patients and doctors who said the government was looking for a reason to avoid reimbursing for the pricey drug.

The infused drug is a first-of-a-kind treatment in that each dose is customized to work with a patient's immune system. Seattle-based Dendreon says Provenge's price reflects the more than $1 billion spent researching and developing the drug. And prostate cancer patients point out that the median survival time with Provenge is double that of chemotherapy, which is about two months and is marked by significant side effects.


Read more: http://apnews.excite.com/article/20110330/D9M9RDFG1.html

[Ian David]

1. Worst. Death Panel. Ever.

Shouldn't a Death Panel be trying to find a way to kill you four months SOONER?

[PeaceNikki]

2. A) No cancer drug should cost $93k B) That's not very "death-panely".

[Mz Pip]

9. No drug of any kind

should cost $93k for 4 months. I wish there were more people who would ask why the high cost, but it does come across to me as a big benefit to the pharmaceutical company.

Then of course there is the issue of the people who aren't yet 65 and covered by Medicare. What happens to them?

[Sal Minella]

15. "people who aren't yet 65 ... What happens to them?"

They are ignored and left to die, of course, since they do not represent a valuable resource that can be mined by Big Pharma for cash.

[madrchsod]

3. my dad was offered a drug that would give him 4 more months

he declined the offer. it was`t the cost of the drug because it would have been covered. it was the quality of life that he decided was`t worth 4 more months. he died within three months of his decision.

[SkyDaddy7]

19. Sorry about your Dad...I know it is hard watching...

Someone you love die like that. :hi: :pals:

I can completely understand why someone would make that decision.

[rzemanfl]

4. If Herbie Mann could have played the flute four months longer

that might have been worth it, beyond that I dunno. Oh, and there's Dan Fogelberg....I think.

[enlightenment]

8. Fogelberg had an aggressive form of the disease - he fought it

for five years and eventually lost the battle, but I believe it spread quickly. (Broke my heart . . .)

[MineralMan]

5. It's just me, but I would refuse both chemotherapy and this

drug if all it offered was two or four months. I'm 65. I simply wouldn't consider it important enough for me to live that much longer, in the face of the expense and the inevitability of my death. Again, that's just me. I cannot speak for any other person. At 65, a guy does think about his mortality sometimes. I've thought about a lot of such situations, and I know what I think about them.

[zalinda]

6. Sorry, but this sounds like another gift to the big pharma n/t

[reformist2]

23. Or not-so-big-but-well-connected pharma. :)

[Lone_Star_Dem]

7. I fail to understand why cancer treatments have gotten so expensive. However...

I understand how an extra 4 months can be a gift depending on the circumstances. It can mean living to see a milestone (birth, graduation, marriage, etc.) which could be invaluable to those you leave behind. I not sure most will choose this treatment, but I'm glad it's made available to those who want it. I just wish it were affordable.

[Hestia]

17. Frontline has an ongoing Death series and one of the episodes

is about those last 4 months, being hooked up to a respirator - once you go on one, it is extremely difficult to stop the machine, survivors guilt, even though the absolute best thing is to just let the person pass. The first thing I did after watching the episode was to go get a Living Will signed asap with DH. I do not want my loved ones to have to make that decision. The patients were constantly told to try this, try this, do that, never go home and say goodbye, though one doctor did state that she is rethinking about how hard she pushes the patients for one more round.The 80+ late stage Alzheimer's patient was the last straw, jeez, the daughters felt so guilty that they hooked her up. A person on a ventilator can last 20 years, to the tune of over $28 billion per year, keeping brain dead people on the juice.

[FLPanhandle]

10. Hate to sound like I'm supporting Pharma companies

However, the cost of R&D plus testing plus getting FDA approval costs millions. Many drugs they spend money on never pan out and then there is the cost of legal suits afterwards.

I can see why the prices can get high quickly.

[w4rma]

11. Very good. (nt)

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

12. I thought it was forbidden for Medicare to negotiate drug prices

so the cost represents the drug company's retail price, whatever they set it at.

Watch for the cost in other countries to come in at a small fraction of 93K.

[Sal Minella]

14. Yes, exactly. American taxpayers will be subsidizing everybody

else on this one.

It's criminal that no negotiation is allowed with Big Pharma on prices.

[reformist2]

24. I've heard of employees who high-fived each other when the $100K price of their drug was announced.

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

27. Yeah, baby! Big Bonus Time!

leeches

[AllTooEasy]

13. would they do the same for a $93K breast cancer drug?

[musette_sf]

16. treatment course of Trastuzumab is $23K less n/t

[truthisfreedom]

18. One billion dollars divided by $93,000 is 10,752 people before they break even.

More than 2 million men in the United States who have been diagnosed with prostate cancer. About 1 man in 36 will die of prostate cancer.

An estimated 32,050 men died from prostate cancer in 2010.

This is a 3 billion dollar a year drug if everyone dying from prostate cancer takes it.

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

20. That's only if the 2 million men are on medicare

Other sources, drugstore chains, insurance companies, etc, will negotiate a better price. $93k is just the full retail that medicare is obligated to pay.

"Negotiating a better price" should be built into "HCR-2", if such a thing ever comes about.

:hi:

[reformist2]

21. I'd love to see a breakdown of medical costs by drug.

[Vinca]

22. Big pharma is exploiting the fear of death to turn a buck.

I would like to know how the patients feel about this at the end of the 4 months.

[trof]

25. My best friend took Provenge last year. He died in February.

He had the treatment at Dana Farber in Boston.
He was a physician, as is his widow.
Although they were both on Medicare (he was 78 at death), they had to pay for it themselves.

They also both believe that Provenge made his last months of life miserable. Pain, nausea.

The last time I saw him, weeks before his death (we live 1500 miles apart), he looked like an Auschwitz survivor. Literally skin and bones.
:-(

[cbdo2007]

26. Dendreon up 4% in pre-market