February 20, 2019
Missing data undermines Pharmac case
The author of an open letter calling for an inquiry into Pharmac says the drug buying agency’s arguments for not funding a range of breast cancer drugs has fallen apart.
Malcolm Mulholland is fighting for a group of wāhine including his wife Wiki to get the drugs they need to fight their advanced stage cancers.
Māori affairs select committee chair Rino Tirikatene this week confirmed the committee has opened a briefing into Pharmac, after which a full inquiry may be considered.
Mr Mulholland says that follows a health select committee hearing last week where the Health Ministry revealed its national cancer register did not collate data by stage.
"So they have no way of knowing how people with different stages of cancer are actually faring so the whole argument by which Pharmac are promoting not to have an inquiry held into it is that we have the same health outcomes (as Australia) but no longer can they make those claims because they don't know the data relating to advanced cancer or cancer by stage," he says.
Mr Mulholland says since Christmas six of the 150 women with breast cancer who presented a petition to parliament last October have died.
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