Posted by Michael Wonder on 08 Feb 2018
Patient advocate says Novartis' 475,000 dollar breakthrough should cost just 160,000 dollars
8 February 2018 - David Mitchell, 67, says he’s sure that Novartis’ Kymriah is a breakthrough medicine, and that he will need a similar medicine to treat his own blood cancer. He’s sure of something else, too: Novartis is charging too much.
Mitchell, a veteran PR man who is president of Patients for Affordable Drugs, says that Kymriah, which costs $475,000 per treatment for children with acute lymphoblastic leukemia, should cost only $160,000. That means the price is triple what it should be, by his math, and that Novartis’ breakthrough is overpriced by $315,000. A research analysis to back up this assertion, co-authored by Mitchell, is being published in the journal Health Affairs this morning, with more detailed results published on Patients for Affordable Drugs’ web site.
“We’re prepared to have Novartis come back and tell us the real numbers,” Mitchell challenges the drug giant. “But don’t pick. If this isn’t right, tell us all the places these numbers aren’t right.”
