Science is enabling us to do amazing things with drugs. But $600,000 a year for treatment? Who can afford that? Who should have to pay for that? How much can society afford to pay? Is our current system the most efficient system for deriving the most benefit?
The Clinton administration brought this issue up over ten years ago but we werent ready to face it. As a culture, we seem to prefer fixing things in the emergency room over avoiding them with prevention.
Healthcare is a very complicated issue, not least of which because it requires us to face our own mortality and the issue of what a human life is worth. It's much easier to avoid until we cant avoid it any longer (or until the next Maria Shrivo stunt).
Dealing with our growing health care crisis will require compromise and someone is going to lose out. There is no national leadership today but we wont be able to put this issue off forever. In the meantime, the pressure will keep building.
A Biotech Drug Extends a Life, But at What Price?
For Ms. Lees, Treatment Bill Now Totals $7 Million; Her Bones Keep Crumbling Guilt of Another $1,400 Day
November 16, 2005
For 25 years, Carol Lees thought she would die early.
In the summer after her freshman year in college, she was diagnosed with Gaucher disease, a disorder that swells internal organs and weakens bones. There was no treatment for this disease, so rare it affects fewer than 10,000 people in the world.
Then in 1991, at age 44, she received a new drug that had been developed for Gaucher. "This is amazing," she told her husband. "I'm going to be given a second chance."
The drug that gave her hope went on to become one of the biotechnology industry's greatest success stories. Yet today, Ms. Lees still struggles to make sense of the unexpected way her life has been shaped by her disease and the medicine. She is grateful the drug has prolonged her life, but she is in constant pain. And her conscience is ill at ease about the price of keeping her alive -- $601,000 a year, or about $7 million so far.
"I often look around and ask myself, 'Is this a $1,400 day?' " says Ms. Lees, who scouted projects for Peter Falk and ran Madonna's production company in the course of a career in the movie business. "Many times, I'm not so sure."
