"As high prices of cancer drugs spark the kind of patient outrage that high AIDS-drug prices unleashed more than a decade ago, a few pharmaceutical and biotech companies are weighing caps and other cost-containment measures, before the outcry turns into a public-relations crisis for the industry."
There's more:
Genentech says it is weighing the use of an independent charity, among other options, for giving away Avastin to patients who exceed a certain annual spending limit. "We're trying to balance the interests of patients, the interests of society and the company's interest -- and our desire to innovate for the best drugs," says David Ebersman, Genentech's chief financial officer.
"There's a groundswell of patients who are outraged," says Jerry Flanagan, health-care policy director for the Foundation for Taxpayer & Consumer Rights, a Los Angeles watchdog group."
A final quote from Schering Plough's Fred " The Rejuvinator" Hassan:
Fred Hassan, chief executive of Schering-Plough Corp., maker of Temodar, a drug for brain tumors, says the controversy over escalating cancer-drug prices is creating "a healthy debate."
"These prices are high, $100,000 a year is high," he says. Still, he adds, high prices are partly justified by the high cost of cancer research and the high rate of product failure.
Insider's view: the gouging will continue. Big Pharma have few "standard blockbusters" (big, chronic use, drugs such as anti-asthmatics, anti-hypertensives and the like) in the pipeline.
So they are attempting to turn cancer into a new gold mine.
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