Robert M. Goldberg
The American Spectator
11/16/2010
Are Medicare director Don Berwick and the Obama administration delaying or denying patients access to medical innovations? That’s a question the Senate’s Finance Committee should ask Berwick, who heads up the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), when he testifies November 17.
The timing couldn’t be better. Medicare won’t pay for Provenge, the first cancer vaccine, since it was approved in April. It’s waiting for the Medicare Coverage Advisory Committee (MEDCAC) — also meeting on the 17th — to decide whether the Food and Drug Administration, the National Cancer Institute, and cancer experts are right in supporting Provenge use for prostate cancer patients…
…The FDA said Provenge “substantially improved survival to patients with a fatal disease. The risks… are minor relative to the benefit of improved survival.” Or perhaps he didn’t see the May 6 National Cancer Institute statement asserting: “The field of cancer immunotherapy received an important boost last week with the FDA’s approval” of Provenge. On May 29 the National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) Drugs & Biologics Compendium added Provenge to its list of standard therapies. On June 15 Aetna said it would cover Provenge…
…MEDCAC meets this week but CMS can take months to decide. This callous and possibly illegal process reflects Berwick’s stated belief that only a centralized entity should decide what’s best for us. People with prostate cancer have died and will die waiting. If that’s not a death panel, I don’t know what is.
Read the entire article at The American Spectator.
