The big news in MS treatment is Gilenya, a disease-modifying drug that is taken by mouth instead of injected or infused. It’s supposed to be more about 50 percent more effective at slowing the progress of the disease.
Plus, it may be effective for treating my primary progressive MS (PPMS), for which there is no current treatment.
It costs $48,000 a year, about a third more than the other disease-modifying drugs, which are injected or infused.
The breathtaking thing is: Fingolimod (FTY720), the active component in Gilenya, can be had wholesale (for research purposes) at $42 for 50 mg. The daily dosage of Gilenya, the brand name for fingolimod, is 0.5 mg. That’s 42 cents for a dose of fingolimod. The cost of a dose of Gilenya is $133.
Fingolimod is cheap because it’s derived from a fungus, Iscaria sinclarii, that’s been used for centuries in Chinese medicine. No bioengineering involved. I haven’t found a description of how it’s actually made, but it’s probably as easy as extracting salicylic acid from willow bark to make aspirin.
More effort and expense go into manufacturing drugs like Avonex and Betaseron, which are beta interferon, made with recombinant DNA technology involving the harvesting of rodent organs. Tysabri (natalizumab) is a monoclonal antibody. Copaxone (glatiramer acetate) is a combination of four synthetically made amino acids.
And then there’s Gilenya. $48,000Â a year for a drug that costs maybe $1,500 to manufacture.
Nobody seems to care about the cost issue. Drug price control is a nonstarter with Congress. Most MS patients have health insurance, and to keep them happy, Novartis, the maker of Gilenya, is committed to picking up the cost of copay to the tune of $800 a month for patients using the drug. That would cover the common copay of 20 percent of the $4,000 monthly cost of the drug. So for the consumer, the drug costs next to nothing.
That’s breathtaking cupidity with a side of business acumen. Quite the corporate model.
One Response to Breathtaking cupidity