8 December 2021 - PHARMAC has been accused of institutional racism and breaching the Treaty of Waitangi for funding drugs for melanoma, but not lung cancer – a disease responsible for a disproportionately high number of cancer deaths among Māori.
Cancer Society medical co-director and Hei Āhuru Mōwai, Māori Cancer Leadership Aotearoa spokesman George Laking said a 2016 decision to fund immunotherapy drug Keytruda to treat advanced melanoma had created an unjust precedent.