Posted by Dennis on May 30, 2002 at 11:08:10:
In Reply to: Why Cheap Drugs Go Unused posted by Dennis on May 17, 2002 at 13:17:57:
Thank You For Printing Elias Reichel, M.D.'s response to to your May 17th article on low cost drugs going unused!
Please print my response as well, its messege is similar, but more direct, opinionated and simple to understand.
Change won't occur until those at the NIH and FDA are put under the spotlight. The drug companies will not waver from their
profit agendas on their own.
Just as Peter Jennings' report (Bitter Medicine) last night on Primetime ABC added to, I applaud your effort to show this most important issue, as billions of dollars for critical medical research are at stake.
Re: Cheap Drugs Going Unused , front page, Friday, May 17
Dr. Meduri is a champion for all patients! In the case of sepsis treatment, Lilly's Xigris is $7000.00 a dose, and of course has a 1,600 patient trial, funded by Lilly, to back up its use. The steroid treatment Dr. Meduri has saved patients lives with costs less than $50, but has little support among the medical community because noone has financial motivation to fund the large scale study to make its use mainstreem.
It is indeed a classic catch-22, with the lives of our kids hanging in the balance.
The NIH turned down funding requests by Dr. Meduri for trials funding, saying it's not
what they do. The NIH should fund studies where no pharma business is motivated to
do so. When will the NIH begin to take steps to put health before profits in our healthcare
system?
Or should we just rename it the
National Institutes of Health of Pharmaceutical Executives' Retirement Funds