I have already published an article on this issue from
Dr. Craig Nichols (Livestrong), but now the American Cancer Society has
recently issued a report on the perils of shortage of important medication used
on the combat of cancer. According to Dr. Otis Brawley, CMO of American Cancer
Society, last year there have been reported 196 types of shortage of
cancer-related drugs, such as Doxil, that helps to prevent ovarian cancer, or methotrexate, used against Acuta Lymphoblastic Leukemia. (see
video above). Up to this year, US Food and Drug
Administration (FDA) already registered roughly 115 drugs that are currently in
shortage. Many of these medicines, specialists say, are very difficult to
replicate and do not commonly have a generic equivalent.
Industries that produce these drugs claim
that sometimes there are not economic incentives for production, or that
temporary interruptions in the production have been caused by “significant manufacturing
and quality concerns”. Be that as it may, the shortage forces hundreds of
cancer patients to wait or to resort to less effective drugs.
FDA, in US, and Ministry of Health, in
Brazil, have already contend that this situation is beginning to create a “second-hand”
market or “grey-market” to drugs that are hard to find. Moreover, prices of
these medications have been gouging steadily, rendering low-income cancer patients
unable to afford them.
In US, the White House announced last
Thursday (Feb 23rd, 2012) that FDA will begin requiring some drug manufacturers to report
production interruptions, notably those drug manufacturers that have no generic
equivalent and are critical to maintaining life.
