Some of my critics claim that I am wrong to tie what happens in the UK to Obamacare. They are wrong. Obamacare envisions instituting centralized cost/benefit/best practices boards that would set the standards of care, what is covered and what not, and eventually who is covered and who not.
The UK’s National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence–the Orwellian-named NICE–is the template promoted by Obamacare’s primary non government pusher, Former Senator Tom Daschle, called by the New York Times to be the most influential adviser to the POTUS and Congressional Democrats on health care reform. Indeed, he has repeatedly stated we need an American version of NICE.
That means what NICE does matters to Americans. And NICE has just refused to pay for chemotherapy for terminally ill breast cancer patients that would extend their lives two to four months. From the story:
A drug which can give women with advanced breast cancer extra weeks or months of life has been turned down by a government watchdog body for use in the NHS. The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (Nice) says it proposes to reject Tyverb (lapatinib) in spite of changes in the rules brought in specifically to allow people at the end of their lives to have the chance of new and often expensive treatments.
Tyverb is the only drug licensed for women with advanced breast cancer whose tumours test positive for a protein called HER2 and for whom Herceptin, a Nice-approved drug, is no longer working. In much of the rest of Europe, Tyverb is then given, in combination with a standard chemotherapy drug called capecitabine. Around 2,000 women in the UK could be eligible for the drug, which has the additional benefit of being taken in pill form, which means that women can stay at home and attempt to live normal lives. Nice turned down Tyverb earlier this year, saying it was too expensive for the benefit to patients it offered…
And don’t forget NICE also pushed the Liverpool Care Pathway, that may have brought back door euthanasia to the UK. Similarly, we recently discussed a similar refusal of coverage in Ontario, Canada, for life-extending colon cancer chemotherapy.
This is our future if we pass Obamacare, unless we explicitly forbid by statute such rationing power to the cost control boards. But attempts to do so have all been turned down. NICE isn’t nice, and it is an approach to health care that Americans should reject.
October 21st, 2009 | 9:20 pm
And do American health insurance companies cover this drug, Wes? Let me guess — you didn’t bother to check.
And how about the 20-odd millon American women with no coverage? They don’t get this drug or any other.
October 21st, 2009 | 9:24 pm
padraig: If they didn’t the regulators would be down their throats and their corporate jets would be sued off.
Stop excusing the inexcusable.
October 21st, 2009 | 9:24 pm
Generally, the only drugs private insurance companies are not required to cover are those which are experimental. This isn’t experimental.
Stop excusing the inexcusable.
October 21st, 2009 | 9:29 pm
FDA approved the drug back in 07 http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/65475.php
October 21st, 2009 | 9:36 pm
Paidraig-and while you’re jumping down Wesley’s throat, did YOU bother to check on whether insurance here will cover it? Gee, guess not. Oh, well.
October 21st, 2009 | 10:31 pm
I am a reviewer for one of the largest health insurance companies in America. We cover Tykerb in this setting. How could we not? The contract we have with our members is to provide “medically necessary” treatment. A drug proven to prolong life is medically necessary!
October 22nd, 2009 | 9:19 am
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Maurice T Judkins , Wesley J. Smith. Wesley J. Smith said: Obamacare: UK’s NICE Strikes Again » Secondhand Smoke | A First Things Blog – http://shar.es/1EZgL [...]
October 22nd, 2009 | 11:21 am
This is the secret behind the “red-pill/blue-pill” scenario that Obama layed out. The difference is if the red-pill actually costs something and the blue pill is “getting you off our balance sheet” then, guess what? Blue-pill it is.
October 22nd, 2009 | 12:18 pm
And you avoided the question about the 20 million uninsured women.
Talk about unexcusable.
October 22nd, 2009 | 12:20 pm
And Dr. Chevlen, I’m very glad your company covers it. Are all other health insurers similarly obligated? And do they all cover the full cost of the drug? Does your company, for that matter?
October 22nd, 2009 | 12:34 pm
padraig: It isn’t anywhere close to 20 million. Uninsured who get cancer usually receive care anyway.
But you are playing the dumb game of this or nothing. It isn’t this or nothing. We need to expand coverage, no question. There are ways to do it without passing this behemoth and impose rationing.
October 22nd, 2009 | 6:02 pm
“padraig: It isn’t anywhere close to 20 million. Uninsured who get cancer usually receive care anyway.”
Even if that’s true (and I doubt it), first off, are they getting care in time? Early detection is the key, and people who don’t have coverage probably don’t get preventive care.
And if such folks do get care, it’s usually the ER. And then their cost is either picked up by the hospital, distorting our health care costs, or the family is run into medical bankruptcy.
“But you are playing the dumb game of this or nothing. It isn’t this or nothing. We need to expand coverage, no question. There are ways to do it without passing this behemoth and impose rationing.”
You’ve been opposed to anything that’s been proposed. If you and the rest of the neo-con puppets are sincere about expanding coverage, get a helmet on and get in the game. All the (non-Snowe) Republicans have done is try to obstruct progress.
October 24th, 2009 | 3:32 am
[...] Consider the words of bioethicist Wesley J. Smith: (H/T ECM) [...]
October 24th, 2009 | 10:24 pm
No, Wesley, we don’t need to expand coverage. We need to get RID of “coverage” and of the insurance companies; THAT’s what will make medical care better, more affordable, and more accessible for everyone. That’s the only thing Obama’s right about — getting rid of the insurance companies — but that’s not why he’s doing what he’s doing. Meanwhile, health care is properly a private matter — no one else’s business but one’s own. People opened the door to this mess by accepting the institution of insurance; now they want to substitute the government for the insurance companies; they just don’t want to stand on their own two feet — which is part of what you correctly pegged as the dumbness of the “it’s this or nothing” point of view. Frankly I think an overwhelming number of people have gotten too stupid to deserve health care, and if they don’t wake up things are going to get even worse. The government doesn’t belong in medicine. This is no better than we can expect from Hillary Clinton, who came from an unsound background, but it’s gotten even worse, now it’s from Obama who can’t handle the economy or the war or international politics, but he’s going to fix health care? By inviting doctors to the White House and making them put on white coats for a photograph. Those who voted for him deserve this. The rest of us don’t.
Padraig: What’s a “neo-con,” anyway. You people who use that term have no idea how dumb you sound when you use it. Go stand over in the corner with Baldwin on Huffington Post.
October 24th, 2009 | 11:28 pm
Padraig: No malice intended; I just couldn’t resist saying that any more than you and your compatriots can resist saying “neocon.” Whatever “neocon” even means.
October 25th, 2009 | 12:37 pm
[...] Consider the words of bioethicist Wesley J. Smith: (H/T ECM) [...]
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