Woman loses Herceptin court bid

[Jacques]

In a week where the Government agreed to spend ?5 billion on something we don't want (I.D. cards), how is this right?

[SID THE CYNIC]

Sorry Jacques, I beg to differ!

On reading the artilcle in the link, my understanding of it is that the drug is yet to be fully licenced.
Certainly ?20k a year is a lot of money, and one has to wonder what other treatments would have to be forgone to fund that sum, so the finances of these things have to be considered, as well as the number of OTHER lives that may be saved by spending that money elsewhere.
If we all go along with the sentimental 'if it's there we must use it and to hell with the cost' mentality than NHS spending will sky rocket, and imagine the political bad news that that would be when taxes go up. Strange then, that it was Anthony Charles Lynton Bliar who twittered on about the 'New' NHS 8 or so years ago.....

As for ID Cards, I haven't yet spoken to anybody in my wide circle of chums is is AGAINST them! Most folk who are anti appear from news items to be the civil liberties/human rights shower who live in cloud cuckoo land. Do they have any conception of the info legally held on us by credit companies, banks, Global video etc!!!!!! The only folk who are to be scared of a compulsory ID card are those with something to hide, are on the fiddle, etc.

So: the court's decision is RIGHT about this drug.
I do feel sorry for the woman, but wonder whether the legal fees have now exceeded a years treatment for her.

Would though, she be creating a stink if she HAD been treated with this UNLICENCED drug, and things had gone wrong. I suspect that Yogi would be there championing her case and seeking negligence compensation.

And why does she need a bloody shaven headed minder/bouncer to introduce her the the waiting cameras outside the court....

[Officer Dibble]

It's right that she should have been given the knock back, because we simply cannot afford it. Although we are one of the riches nations in the world our wealth is still finite. That means that what we have will have to be divi'd up and the best way of dividing it up is the stuff of political, moral and economic argument. Every other area of government spending will be clamouring for more money, saying that they have a special case and they simply must have more dough at the expense of other areas. But there will never be enough money to spend on everything, to satisfy everyone. We have to accept that.

The cynical, platitude spewing smarmy gits of the government should just come clean, spit it out, and say "Sorry, we aren?t going to fund that, because we simply can't afford it. If we fund that up it will mean cutting funding to other departments with equally pressing life or death claims on the available resources". Never mind letting the courts do their dirty work. You could respect politicians who simply told the truth, however disrespectful or unpalatable it was (well, I could anyway).


Officer Dibble

[Jacques]

OK - consider this then:

The Government can find ?5 billion of a National Identity Scheme but is unwilling to 'find' the money and put it into the NHS. Which would you say is more important to your life?

Secondly the cost of ?20k is set by Roche. They have spent millions in developing the drug and quite rightly want to recoup the cost. They hold a Patent for I think three years. So they have three years to recoup the development cost. What if they increased the price of Paracetomol, Iburofen etc. by 1p? Would that not offset the cost and make the drug cheaper?

Ahh!!! You say it's UNLICENCED. No it isn't, it is licenced in the UK for advanced breast cancer. Why should anyone have to wait until the have advanced cancer to get the treatment?

Lastly if the money in the NHS was more wisely spent there ought to be money for just these kind of scenarios. What about those nice sculptures and pieces of artwork? Justified NHS spending?

[Porn crackers]

We have enough money for all this Iraq and Afghanistan bollocks and can't look after our own people. It makes my blood boil.......

PC

[SID THE CYNIC]

Jacques,

I really don't want this to degenerate inot a slagging match, as with all too many discussions in this forum, but, my dear boy, it was the article which YOU posted which states the drug is UNLICENCED!!

Sid

[Jacques]

Yes it is UNLICENCED for early stage breast cancer but not for advanced cancer. That does not mean that it cannot be or should not be used, it simply means that is is not available freely on the NHS for this purpose.

If UNLICENCED, as you choose to accept the meaning of the word, means that you can't use it then people would not be able to have the drug in the first place. Many women are being given the drug so that theory is out of the window.

It is currently down to PCT's to decide on whether to make the drug available or not - you know a Post Code lottery, a Regional Health Service not a National one. Which one do you pay your NI for?

So bollocks to the legal deffinition of a word or the fact that a PCT hid behind this to deny a woman a chance at life, is it right that the NHS should fail women with breast cancer because of mismanagement and bullshit spending?

Herceptin has been around for almost 20 years. Does it really take that long to get a licence?

[dynatech]

It's not about looking after us though is it!
The name of the game is fear, and in CANCER the authorities worldwide have found something that scares us all stiff, and yet apparantly, while we work miricles with technology, has remained "uncurable".... The same people that promote cancer research and new wonder-drugs are also very keen to hide the facts that nature has a cure for all ills, including cancer, but unfortunately billion dollar multi-nationals cannot patent natural medicine so have rubbished such claims, even going as far as to BAN (yes, that word again, protecting us all from ourselves!) apricot kernals in the USA.
Don't believe me?
Have a look on www.credence.org , it will open your eyes (if you are interested, if not do not)

[Cenobitez]

A doctor friend of mine used to work for Roche (now works for Astra Zeneca) his main bit of work was with a drug called Orlistat, but he was saying R&D started around 15 yrs ago, and the final formula was devised about 5 yrs ago and its been going to staged trials.

At this point as best i caught from the conversation between other doctor types, there is very little evidence from trials with women with early stages of HER-2 so there is little to no proof its effective at that stage, but majority of the trials was with advanced stages.

Like i said i'm no expert, just what i caught from the conversation.

[Jacques]

20 - 25% I believe the figure to be.