Posted by Michael Wonder on 14 Dec 2017
Months after approval, breakthrough cancer drug given to just five patients
14 December 2017 - No Medicare coverage, one-by-one rulings by private insurers.
Two months after Gilead Sciences Inc.’s breakthrough treatment was approved in the U.S. to treat a deadly form of blood cancer, only a tiny handful of patients have actually gotten the costly therapy, while others linger on waiting lists.
Five people have received the treatment, called Yescarta, at the 15 cancer hospitals authorised to administer it in the U.S., the hospitals told Bloomberg. Waiting lists for the $373,000 treatment have grown to at least 200 people, shrinking only as some very sick patients have died.
