cannabisnews.com: MS Sufferers Welcome Drug Move





MS Sufferers Welcome Drug Move
Posted by FoM on December 26, 1999 at 08:56:05 PT
Govt to fund drug for 130
Source: The Press
Multiple sclerosis sufferers can look forward to Government funding for treatment of their chronic disease next year. Health Minister Annette King has directed the Health Funding Authority to instruct Pharmac to fund beta-interferon for up to 130 people next year. 
The subsidy ends a three-year battle by MS sufferers for funding for the drug.Christchurch sufferer Marie Blackwell said the subsidy was a good step but hoped it would be increased so all sufferers could experience the benefits of beta-interferon. Ms Blackwell has suffered no relapses since starting beta-interferon treatment three years ago. She injects herself every two days, with each injection costing $100, which she funds herself. "If these drugs are staving off attacks and giving people like me another five years out of the wheelchair, we should be funding it." Sonya Forrester, of Christchurch, suffers from regular relapses, and hopes she will be eligible for the beta-interferon subsidy. "I just want the chance to try it while I can still walk and see if it makes a difference before I end up in a wheelchair," she said. "Everyone should have the chance to try it." MS is a chronic disease of the nervous system that causes ongoing progression of disability. While there is no cure, clinical trials have shown beta-interferon drugs can help reduce the number of relapses in some patients by a third, and the rate of severe attacks by half. Beta-interferon can also delay the onset of disability. Funding for the drug has been refused twice by Pharmac, most recently in July when Pharmac decided that further work on access criteria was needed before funding could be approved. Pharmac general manager Wayne McNee said it had been a difficult decision to process because the benefits of beta-interferon in most patients were low relative to the cost. "At $20,000 a patient a year, the drug is simply too expensive to subsidise for everyone with MS, when we know the majority will not benefit significantly," Mr McNee said. To be eligible for the new funding patients must have active relapsing MS and have had at least two significant relapses in the previous year. Diagnosis and each relapse must be confirmed by a neurologist. Neurologist Dr Ernie Willoughby said consideration of eligibility for the subsidy would not be an easy process for patients or neurologists. Pharmac will set up a committee of neurologists to review applications for subsidies, but it has not indicated what it will do if more than 130 people meet the funding criteria, Dr Willoughby said. It would be January before neurologists would get a clearer indication from Pharmac how they were to process applications for beta-interferon, he said. Previously, New Zealand, Russia, and Estonia were the only countries that did not subsidise beta-interferons. Newshawk: Sledhead Copyright: 1999 The PressPubdate: Mon, 27 Dec 1999 Copyright: 1999 The Press
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