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$1, 000 a Pill, Sovaldi Jolts US Health Care System
abc news ^ | 6-17-2014 | RICARDO ALONSO-ZALDIVAR

Posted on 06/17/2014 10:46:23 AM PDT by Citizen Zed

Sovaldi, a new pill for hepatitis C, cures the liver-wasting disease in 9 of 10 patients, but treatment can cost more than $90,000.

Leading medical societies recommend the drug as a first-line treatment, and patients are clamoring for it. But insurance companies and state Medicaid programs are gagging on the price. In Oregon, officials propose to limit how many low-income patients can get Sovaldi.

Yet if Sovaldi didn't exist, insurers would still be paying in the mid-to-high five figures to treat the most common kind of hepatitis C, a new pricing survey indicates. Some of the older alternatives involve more side effects, and are less likely to provide cures.

So what's a fair price?

(Excerpt) Read more at abcnews.go.com ...


TOPICS: Chit/Chat
KEYWORDS: gougeingbastards
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Maybe Obama can just declare the pill free?
1 posted on 06/17/2014 10:46:23 AM PDT by Citizen Zed
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To: Citizen Zed

Sounds like pure opportunity costing.


2 posted on 06/17/2014 10:50:25 AM PDT by I am Richard Brandon
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To: Citizen Zed

That pill will probably be available over-the-counter in some country overseas.


3 posted on 06/17/2014 10:51:36 AM PDT by 353FMG
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To: Citizen Zed
Maybe Obama can just declare the pill free?

Better yet - just sign an executive order banning hepatitis C!

4 posted on 06/17/2014 10:54:46 AM PDT by FatherofFive (Islam is evil and must be eradicated)
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To: Citizen Zed

Saved my friend’s life...

Nothing else worked....


5 posted on 06/17/2014 11:03:15 AM PDT by Vendome (Don't take life so seriously-you won't live through it anyway-Enjoy Yourself ala Louis Prima)
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To: Citizen Zed
This from NPR...
Dr Camilla Graham of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston thinks that the high cost of the new hepatitis C treatments might be justified.

"Maybe we decide that $100,000 is a worthwhile investment to cure someone of an otherwise devastating chronic infection," Graham says. After all, it can now cost up to $300,000 to treat patients with advanced hepatitis C, using less effective and more harrowing regimens.

Graham is a hep-C specialist. So she knows firsthand how the slow-moving virus kills patients by destroying their livers and causing liver cancer. The virus is the main reason that nearly 17,000 Americans are waiting for a liver transplant.

Source: npr.org


6 posted on 06/17/2014 11:03:43 AM PDT by RoosterRedux (Obama: Race is his cover...jihad is his game.)
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To: Vendome
Yep.

In most cases, Sovaldi is an absolute cure...and at 1/3 the price of other treatments that often don't work and have bad side effects.

7 posted on 06/17/2014 11:05:59 AM PDT by RoosterRedux (Obama: Race is his cover...jihad is his game.)
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To: Citizen Zed

How about waiting for India to make their own pirated version, subsequently importing it via the internet?

/s


8 posted on 06/17/2014 11:08:47 AM PDT by bkopto (Free men are not equal. Equal men are not free.)
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To: I am Richard Brandon

For that kind of money, I’d like a GUARANTEED cure to come with it (money back if not cured). In that case, given the cost (or even availability) of a liver transplant and it’s attendant lifetime maintenance, it would be a bargain.

HOW COME medical crap is the ONLY THING still sold without a guarantee? Why would that be unreasonable?


9 posted on 06/17/2014 11:09:17 AM PDT by The Antiyuppie ("When small men cast long shadows, then it is very late in the day.")
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To: I am Richard Brandon
I am a health insurance agent.
Many injectable, refrigerated drugs with short shelf lives are very expensive.
I have a transplant patient client whose RX bill is well over $60,000 a year, and she would be broke or dead without her Part D plan paying most of that for her.
10 posted on 06/17/2014 11:10:04 AM PDT by Kansas58
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To: bkopto

“How about waiting for India to make their own pirated version, subsequently importing it via the internet?”

Wow, if they could do that, it would make dope dealers look like paupers.


11 posted on 06/17/2014 11:10:32 AM PDT by The Antiyuppie ("When small men cast long shadows, then it is very late in the day.")
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To: The Antiyuppie

Can you get that “guarantee” to include monitoring of their drinking and smoking habits, their diet and exercise habits and sleep habits?
Do we want such controls?
No we do not.
That is your answer.


12 posted on 06/17/2014 11:12:05 AM PDT by Kansas58
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To: The Antiyuppie

India has been able to do some interesting things with Aids drugs. I would not put it past them.


13 posted on 06/17/2014 11:12:38 AM PDT by DonaldC (A nation cannot stand in the absence of religious principle.)
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To: The Antiyuppie

Start your own medical clinic, hire doctors and give that guarantee.

Get back to us.


14 posted on 06/17/2014 11:16:29 AM PDT by RoadGumby (This is not where I belong, Take this world and give me Jesus.)
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To: Kansas58

So?


15 posted on 06/17/2014 11:19:58 AM PDT by I am Richard Brandon
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To: The Antiyuppie

They dont call it practicing medicine for nothing..


16 posted on 06/17/2014 11:29:26 AM PDT by cableguymn (It's time for a second political party.)
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To: Citizen Zed
"In Oregon, officials propose [death panels] to limit how many low-income patients can get Sovaldi. "

At least THAT part of PelosiReidcare is working...

17 posted on 06/17/2014 11:29:34 AM PDT by mrsmith (Dumb sluts: Lifeblood of the Media, Backbone of the Democrat Party!)
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To: Citizen Zed

That’s crazy.


18 posted on 06/17/2014 11:30:23 AM PDT by freekitty (Give me back my conservative vote; then find me a real conservative to vote for)
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To: I am Richard Brandon

So, your question about cost must be answered with an understanding of the drug involved, hard to make, hard to keep in a usable form.
Also, your comments should be balanced with the fact that other drugs are also very expensive. Shelf life can have a great deal to do with expense.
Product liability costs can also be huge.
Balance those costs against the benefit to the patients.
And the benefits to the claims payers, government and insurance companies alike.


19 posted on 06/17/2014 11:41:43 AM PDT by Kansas58
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To: Vendome

I have 4 weeks to go on the Sovaldi treatment. The virus is undetectable now and the doctors think it will stay that way. I have taken the standard treatment twice before and as soon as the treatment stopped the virus returned.

I was close to needing a transplant. My liver enzyme numbers are now in the low normal range and my platelets are higher than they have been for 15 years.

This drug is fantastic. There are few if any side effects unlike the other treatment that requires excessive monitoring which runs the costs up with the Sovaldi program. Plus, many folks feel suicidal when taking the interferon, so much so, all of the manufacturers have a corporate nurse call you weekly while taking the interferon.

This cost equation being offered isn’t examining all the factors.

This will pass...Gilead has another drug that is expected to clear the FDA in October that has a 100% cure rate and within 2 years or so there will be a vaccine released that will end the death and suffering from this insidious disease.

I caught the virus 35 years ago from a tainted blood transfusion related to a surgical procedure. I’ve never been a drinker, yet I have non-alcoholic cirrhosis in the 4/5 range. Hopefully killing the virus will help my liver rejuvenate enough the canalization of my Aorta will cease and the fibrosis will decrease thus reducing the cancer threat.

Right now in America 16,000 people die annually from this disease...what is the cost of that, both financially and emotionally?


20 posted on 06/17/2014 11:41:56 AM PDT by bigfootbob
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