CrosswordNewsletters
DAILY BEAST
ALL
  • Cheat Sheet
  • Obsessed
  • Politics
  • Crime
  • Entertainment
  • Media
  • Innovation
  • Opinion
  • World
  • U.S. News
  • Scouted
CHEAT SHEET
    POLITICS
    • Fever Dreams
    • Biden World
    • Elections
    • Opinion
    • National Security
    • Congress
    • Pay Dirt
    • The New Abnormal
    • Right Richter
    • Trumpland
    MEDIA
    • Confider
    • Daytime Talk
    • Late-Night
    • Fox News
    U.S. NEWS
    • Identities
    • Crime
    • Race
    • LGBT
    • Extremism
    • Coronavirus
    WORLD
    • Russia
    • Europe
    • China
    • Middle East
    INNOVATION
    • Science
    TRAVEL
      ENTERTAINMENT
      • TV
      • Movies
      • Music
      • Comedy
      • Sports
      • Sex
      • TDB's Obsessed
      • Awards Shows
      • The Last Laugh
      CULTURE
      • Power Trip
      • Fashion
      • Books
      • Royalist
      TECH
      • Disinformation
      SCOUTED
      • Clothing
      • Technology
      • Beauty
      • Home
      • Pets
      • Kitchen
      • Fitness
      • I'm Looking For
      BEST PICKS
      • Best VPNs
      • Best Gaming PCs
      • Best Air Fryers
      COUPONS
      • Vistaprint Coupons
      • Ulta Coupons
      • Office Depot Coupons
      • Adidas Promo Codes
      • Walmart Promo Codes
      • H&M Coupons
      • Spanx Promo Codes
      • StubHub Promo Codes
      Products
      NewslettersPodcastsCrosswordsSubscription
      FOLLOW US
      GOT A TIP?

      SEARCH

      HOME
      Hunt for the Cure

      Trump’s Cancer Panel Doesn’t Know How to Lower Drug Prices

      WHAT NEXT?

      Cancer drugs plunge patients into debt and bankruptcy. A panel recommends costs get slashed. How, though, remains fuzzy.

      Tanya Basu

      Senior Editor, Science

      Updated Mar. 15, 2018 1:37PM ET / Published Mar. 14, 2018 9:30PM ET 
      trump cancer panel drug

      Photo Illustration by The Daily Beast

      In a report published earlier this week, the President’s Cancer Panel called for closer scrutiny of the costs of cancer drugs, calling for the price reduction of lifesaving treatments.

      The problem? There’s no formalized plan to do so—yet.

      Ann Gieger, an adviser to the panel and the deputy associate director of Healthcare Delivery Research Program at the National Cancer Institute's Division of Cancer Control and Population Sciences, told The Daily Beast that the next steps are still pending.

      "In the most proximal sense, [cancer is] experienced by patients and families not just at treatment but at cancer survivorship" which often requires a spate of drugs to ensure remission, she said.

      The panel, which was created during the Richard Nixon administration's "War on Cancer," periodically meets to discuss cancer treatments and to update the president, offering recommendations to the president for combating the disease and its impact on Americans.

      Keyword: recommendations, which means that while the panel's recommendation to reduce the cost of cancer treatment drugs is certainly admirable and a step forward in making these treatments more available to those who might not be able to afford groundbreaking experimental treatments and clinical trials, there's as yet no real plan to implement.

      "The report doesn't get quite that specific [regarding value]," Gieger admitted, saying that in the United States, there is no real body defining what that value is. “The National Academy of Science, Engineering, and Medicine will have to convene to define what 'value' is [defined as]." Doing so, Gieger said, would allow the panel to scientifically assess the benefit each dose of a cancer drug brings to a patient to judge the true cost of each cancer drug.

      The panel, which focused on overall cancer drug costs, did not research whether certain forma of cancer were more expensive to treat than others.

      As for how cancer drug prices could be slashed? Gieger admitted that the panel doesn’t have the relevant data yet to be able to make those sorts of suggestions. "The panel is purely advisory, and the recommendations tend to be broad," she said.

      So what good are these cancer panels if they can't lead to viable solutions?

      "There are a number of things that can happen in the next couple years," Gieger said. "We can call for the FDA to have appropriate resources [set aside] for safety and efficacy.”

      The last panel, which convened in 2012 and 2013, pushed for HPV vaccinations to be increased among girls (boys have also been encouraged to get vaccinated, but the initiative and recommendation here was focused on girls; "I can't speak to boys," Gieger said).

      But it was difficult to ascertain exactly what the benefits were. "I'm aware of improvement for girls [vaccination rates]," Gieger told The Daily Beast. "Things do happen as a result." In 2016, 60 percent of girls had gotten HPV vaccinations, an increase of 4 percentage points, according to the CDC.

      That the panel is making recommendations for the reduction of cancer drug costs is noteworthy, and certainly will help the millions of Americans who struggle to pay for treatment, bankrupting themselves as they seek desperately to extend their lives and beat cancer.

      "If the complexity of the stakeholders panel could cause things to move in a year, that would be great," Gieger said of a potential timeline. "There is going to be a fair amount of work for stakeholders"—who she defined as not just patients, but their families, the government, pharmaceutical companies, and employers who purchase insurance coverage for employees. "Many people are affected, and we really have to provide a foundation for those conversations."

      READ THIS LIST

      DAILY BEAST
      • Cheat Sheet
      • Politics
      • Entertainment
      • Media
      • World
      • Innovation
      • U.S. News
      • Scouted
      • Travel
      • Subscription
      • Crossword
      • Newsletters
      • Podcasts
      • About
      • Contact
      • Tips
      • Jobs
      • Advertise
      • Help
      • Privacy
      • Code of Ethics & Standards
      • Diversity
      • Terms & Conditions
      • Copyright & Trademark
      • Sitemap
      • Best Picks
      • Coupons
      • Coupons:
      • Dick's Sporting Goods Coupons
      • HP Coupon Codes
      • Chewy Promo Codes
      • Nordstrom Rack Coupons
      • NordVPN Coupons
      • JCPenny Coupons
      • Nordstrom Coupons
      • Samsung Promo Coupons
      • Home Depot Coupons
      • Hotwire Promo Codes
      • eBay Coupons
      • Ashley Furniture Promo Codes
      © 2023 The Daily Beast Company LLC