Latest Drugwonks' Blog
Let’s be honest --the fundamental assumption behind the push for a comparative effectiveness agency in the US is that high drug prices are the primary reason American healthcare costs are on the rise. That's simply not true. Drug prices went up less than 1 percent last year, well below the rate of inflation. Pharmaceuticals are about 11% of our national healthcare spend – with on-patent medications representing only about 7 percent. (Something to remember when we debate the non-interference clause and drug importation.)
In theory, properly designed comparative effectiveness studies can be a valuable tool in patient care. In theory. But in practice, in an increasingly personalized world, do large scale studies such as ALLHAT and CATIE really help? Marginally – at best. But all they really end up accomplishing is reaffirming the outdated methodologies of a cost-based system, when what we really need are the proper tools for patient-centric medicine.
While it’s true that comparative effectiveness and healthcare technology assessment (HTA) aren’t the same thing – the question on the table is whether one inevitably leads to the other. And with all the attention being paid to the “need for a US NICE,” the answer is “yes.”
To read more on this topic – and why Senator Baucus needs to go back to the drawing board, click here.
In theory, properly designed comparative effectiveness studies can be a valuable tool in patient care. In theory. But in practice, in an increasingly personalized world, do large scale studies such as ALLHAT and CATIE really help? Marginally – at best. But all they really end up accomplishing is reaffirming the outdated methodologies of a cost-based system, when what we really need are the proper tools for patient-centric medicine.
While it’s true that comparative effectiveness and healthcare technology assessment (HTA) aren’t the same thing – the question on the table is whether one inevitably leads to the other. And with all the attention being paid to the “need for a US NICE,” the answer is “yes.”
To read more on this topic – and why Senator Baucus needs to go back to the drawing board, click here.
The out of touch editorial board of the NY Times writing from the only valuable asset left in the Sulzburger empire (the superfluous new building on 8th Avenue) tries to explain would use generic drugs but for the advertising efforts of brand name drug companies.
Which is sort of like saying the NYT readership should continue to decline as people just pick up the news from any old source even in the face of those annoying and relentless ads the paper keeps running...
What I find interesting is that there are actually still 40 pages in the paper's section A...
Read More
Which is sort of like saying the NYT readership should continue to decline as people just pick up the news from any old source even in the face of those annoying and relentless ads the paper keeps running...
What I find interesting is that there are actually still 40 pages in the paper's section A...
Read More
Wny not extend this concept to every aspect of health care possible? Why not pay people for NOT using health care services, for staying healthy, for exercising?
Stay healthy, pay less.
Get healthy, earn money
Prevent disease, get paid.
Read article here
Stay healthy, pay less.
Get healthy, earn money
Prevent disease, get paid.
Read article here
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Lest anyone forget, the indicted Democrat governor had lots of friends the last time he peddled his failed and fudged I-SaveRx program to reimport drugs from wholesalers in Canada, Ireland and other places that Blago made up on the fly....another scam:
"Blagojevich has been among a growing bipartisan group of politicians that is fighting Bush on the importation issue. He and U.S. Rep. Rahm Emanuel, D-Ill., contend that increasing drug imports will create competitive pressures that will force pharmaceutical companies to lower their prices in the United States. The two have even organized a program, so far lightly used, in which residents in Illinois and a few other states can purchase drugs through the Internet from Canada and Europe."
"Blagojevich has been among a growing bipartisan group of politicians that is fighting Bush on the importation issue. He and U.S. Rep. Rahm Emanuel, D-Ill., contend that increasing drug imports will create competitive pressures that will force pharmaceutical companies to lower their prices in the United States. The two have even organized a program, so far lightly used, in which residents in Illinois and a few other states can purchase drugs through the Internet from Canada and Europe."
Canada considers plan to stop Internet, mail-order drug sales to Americans.
Source: 
Chicago Tribune (Chicago, IL)
NHS has SURPLUS of £2billion in the bank after underspending
By JO MACFARLANE
Last updated at 2:21 AM on 08th June 2008
Surplus: Shadow Health Secretary Andrew Lansley claimed the government had failed to use taxpayers money to provide care at a time of cuts
The NHS has underspent by more than £2billion after slashing training and cutting patient care.
About two per cent of last year's total NHS budget was not spent - just two years after the NHS was £547million in debt.
Meanwhile biotech in Britain in dying....thanks to NICE
In 2007, Sir David Cooksey, one of the fathers of British biotech said that "The UK is home to the strongest medical research community in Europe, yet there is no framework for bringing innovation from university laboratories and research organisations into the business world. The presence of the drugs-rationing group the National Institute of Health and Clinical Excellence adds a layer of bureaucracy absent in Europe or the United States."
Now...
Read Here
Peter Orzsag, the CBO Director who believes innovation is the source of many of the health care systems dysfunctions should be happy. Rationing innovation saves money...kills innovation. I am sure the perpetual priapism of self pronouncement against medical progress such as Merrill Goozner and Healthcare Renewal should be covulsing with joy over the demise of innovation and the surplus of dollars due to the denial of care as the result of comparative effectiveness. Dollars in the counting house from rationing. If only Dickens were alive today!
By JO MACFARLANE
Last updated at 2:21 AM on 08th June 2008
Surplus: Shadow Health Secretary Andrew Lansley claimed the government had failed to use taxpayers money to provide care at a time of cuts
The NHS has underspent by more than £2billion after slashing training and cutting patient care.
About two per cent of last year's total NHS budget was not spent - just two years after the NHS was £547million in debt.
Meanwhile biotech in Britain in dying....thanks to NICE
In 2007, Sir David Cooksey, one of the fathers of British biotech said that "The UK is home to the strongest medical research community in Europe, yet there is no framework for bringing innovation from university laboratories and research organisations into the business world. The presence of the drugs-rationing group the National Institute of Health and Clinical Excellence adds a layer of bureaucracy absent in Europe or the United States."
Now...
Read Here
UK biotech leaders demand government investment for its survival
Monday 8 December 2008
Simon Varcoe - Reporter
Peter Orzsag, the CBO Director who believes innovation is the source of many of the health care systems dysfunctions should be happy. Rationing innovation saves money...kills innovation. I am sure the perpetual priapism of self pronouncement against medical progress such as Merrill Goozner and Healthcare Renewal should be covulsing with joy over the demise of innovation and the surplus of dollars due to the denial of care as the result of comparative effectiveness. Dollars in the counting house from rationing. If only Dickens were alive today!
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Lots of letters in today's edition of the New York Times on NICE and the issue of cost-based vs. patient-centric care. To see them all, click here.
Here's my contribution:
To the Editor:
The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence in Britain is set to lift its ban on several kidney cancer drugs. The move will give patients access to lifesaving medicines that had previously been deemed “too costly” to cover under public health insurance.
This reversal is effectively an acknowledgment that the agency hasn’t worked as intended. By denying patients access to cutting-edge treatments simply because of cost, it has heartlessly put lives at risk.
Peter Pitts
New York, Dec. 3, 2008
The writer is president of the Center for Medicine in the Public Interest and a former associate commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration.
Here's my contribution:
To the Editor:
The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence in Britain is set to lift its ban on several kidney cancer drugs. The move will give patients access to lifesaving medicines that had previously been deemed “too costly” to cover under public health insurance.
This reversal is effectively an acknowledgment that the agency hasn’t worked as intended. By denying patients access to cutting-edge treatments simply because of cost, it has heartlessly put lives at risk.
Peter Pitts
New York, Dec. 3, 2008
The writer is president of the Center for Medicine in the Public Interest and a former associate commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration.
Barbara Stanwyck (the actress) said of egotism that it's a case of mistaken nonentity. The same can be said the rampant speculation and self-promotion regarding who is going to be the next FDA commissioner. Lots of people weighing in who don't know the full story or the full weight of the job. Lots of second guessing. Only one or two people who are willing to stand and accept the responsbility and stand by decisions regardless of what is said to attract the crowd or generate a headline.
That's why Janet Woodcock's statement regarding Vytorin and Avandia are so courageous and on point: "People have convicted them without a trial." But she has taken similar stands on drugs that others though should have been approved, but have not, because of lack of compelling benefit data, and on demanding that FDA have more hires, that staff actually get paid on time, that the new FDA building have a cafeteria(!).
Drugwonks has made it clear who it thinks should NOT be FDA commissioner. But with regard to who should FDA Commissioner, it should be someone who can emulate and admire Janet Woodcock's dedication to science-based overhaul of the agency.
That's why Janet Woodcock's statement regarding Vytorin and Avandia are so courageous and on point: "People have convicted them without a trial." But she has taken similar stands on drugs that others though should have been approved, but have not, because of lack of compelling benefit data, and on demanding that FDA have more hires, that staff actually get paid on time, that the new FDA building have a cafeteria(!).
Drugwonks has made it clear who it thinks should NOT be FDA commissioner. But with regard to who should FDA Commissioner, it should be someone who can emulate and admire Janet Woodcock's dedication to science-based overhaul of the agency.
According to the Wall Street Journal, HHS Secretary-Presumptive Tom Daschle wants Americans to host “holiday-season house parties to brainstorm over how best to overhaul the U.S. health-care system,” He’ll make the suggestion as part of his case for health reform in a speech to be delivered in Denver today.
(PS/ Why hasn't Daschle's nomination been made official yet?)
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