No Cure, No Charge: How to make a drug company bankrupt

26 July 2007

Now here’s an interesting idea that is being tested in the UK. A drug company has agreed to charge the country’s National Health Service for its multiple myeloma drug Velcade (bortezomib) only if it cures the patient.

It will refund the full cost of the drug to every patient who doesn’t respond to the drug, provided it is prescribed according to the company’s specifications. Doctors should use the drug only if other drugs have failed, and the patient is not suitable for bone marrow transplantation.

A correspondent for the British Medical Journal commented: “The announcement was a sobering reminder that most medicines do not work in all patients.”

We think it’s a great scheme. If it was adopted globally, drug companies would be bankrupt by Christmas.

(Source: British Medical Journal, 2007; 335: 122-3).

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No Cure, No Charge: How to make a drug company bankrupt

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