Drug subsidy delay a matter of life and death for cancer patients

A BUREAUCRATIC hitch means it could be months before 2000 bowel cancer patients find out whether the government will subsidise a life-saving medicine.

Drug subsisdy

A BUREAUCRATIC hitch means it could be months before 2000 bowel cancer patients find out whether the government will subsidise a life-saving new medicine that is costing them $2000 a week.

Under a deal with the medicine industry, the federal cabinet was last week meant to have decided whether to subsidise the drug Erbitux, which can add five months to a cancer patient's life.

It failed to meet that deadline and now says it has to wait for a Medicare rebate to be set for a $250 genetic test patients need before they use the drug.

Every week that the government delays the subsidy it saves $2.5 million.

Erbitux is the latest test of the government's new policy requiring savings offsets for each new drug subsidised.

Erbitux works for the 65 per cent of patients who have KRAS wild-type bowel cancer and a test is needed to establish whether they will benefit.

The Medical Services Advisory Committee told the government on December 3 to fund the test, but four months later the Health Department is still considering what price it will pay.

"The Department of Health and Ageing has been working to finalise pricing negotiations for the test," a department spokeswoman said.

The Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee approved Erbitux for subsidy last July but it was not until October that Merck Serono applied for a Medicare rebate for the gene test.

Melbourne oncologist Peter Gibbs said yesterday that patients were happy to foot the $250 for the test, but wanted a subsidy for the cost of the drug.

"Quite a few of the patients waiting have had the test performed already, probably 30 to 40 per cent of the patients waiting would have had the test," Associate Professor Gibbs said.

Bowel cancer patient Paul Haines has been using Erbitux and a similar medication for more than a year and has suffered an acute skin reaction from it but his tumours have shrunk by 30 per cent. "I think I would probably be dead by now without this drug. The cancer has gone from my bowel to my liver to my lymph nodes," the father of four-year-old Isla said.

Clinical trials show Erbitux can prolong the life of a late-stage bowel cancer patient by an average five months.

The drug is subsidised for late-stage bowel cancer patients in Britain, the US, France and Germany.

The drug helps shrink tumours and slow their growth by blocking the epidermal growth factor receptor, which promotes cell growth and division.