Linda and Sue Broadhurst
at Sue's wedding
Remember my suggestion that a large fraction of Liberal Arts
graduates go to work for the federal government – and spend the rest of their
lives writing reports? Well, PhDs and
M.Ds write reports, too. Here is an
important one.
In a nutshell, a learned panel considered the following
question – “How can we afford cancer treatment?” – and came up with a lengthy
discussion of possibilities. I was
prepared to use some cute adjectives – “turgid”, perhaps, or “bureaucratic”, or
even “annoying” – but they don’t fit.
The report is long, but it is well written, well organized,
well-illustrated, and even thoughtful. I
intend to study it carefully and give you my take in a few days (too busy right
now, what with my mad social life and all.)
You might give it a try. To whet
your appetite:
The average yearly cost of new cancer drugs is
$100,000. Some go as high as
$400,000.
Some of these drugs are truly transformative, but others
only provide a few more months of life.
Urgently needed is a way to process drug effectiveness into
pricing policy.
I love the term in introduced by the panel – “Financial
Toxicity”.
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