National drug-buying agency Pharmac yesterday announced plans to fund breast cancer drug Kadcyla, as well as a lung cancer treatment and a drug to treat Multiple Sclerosis.
The drugs will be funded by December 1.
It comes days after cancer campaigner Michael Mulholland joined Breakfast to call for life-extending or life-saving cancer drugs Ibrance and Kadcyla to be publicly funded in New Zealand.
Speaking to TVNZ1's Breakfast today Troy Elliott, who has been campaigning for Kadcyla to be funded by Pharmac to extend the life of his wife Tracey and other women with stage four breast cancer, said he had "mixed emotions" about the funding announcement.
Michael Mulholland discussed the lack of life-saving or extending cancer drugs. (Source: Other)
"It was just one of those days where we had mixed emotions, wanting to scream and yell and clap and do everything, but also realise it’s just stage one of actually getting more drugs funded."
Mr Elliott said they "almost feel guilty for feeling so ecstatic."
"We are happy – we're incredibly happy. But to realise that since we've been campaigning for this, women have died because of the fact that they couldn't access these drugs … Michael and Wiki [Mulholland] are sitting there and waiting for Ibrance, as are hundreds of other New Zealanders as well.
"But we're going to take this as a win."
While Kadcyla is publicly funded in Australia and the UK, where the drug is proven to be effective, Pharmac had been slow to publicly fund the drug in New Zealand. Kadcyla currently costs Mr Elliott $9000 for the treatment "every three or four weeks."
Mr Elliott said the long wait for the drug has "driven us crazy, to be honest", but "that's the way it is, and that's the way it's been for so long."
The agency is also looking into new treatments for lung cancer and multiple sclerosis. (Source: Other)
"That's just wrong. It's criminal that we're in a situation like that. We can't afford to be a third-world country when it comes to medicines - that's the way we feel we are at the moment."
He called online fundraising site Givealittle "a surrogate Pharmac" which "shouldn't be happening in New Zealand."
"Now, we're in a situation that this drug's going to be funded, but we won't give the fight up. You know, we need to triple our Pharmac budget for medicines."
He reiterated Mr Mulholland’s calls for Pharmac to triple their funding from the Government, saying "we need to look at a situation where, in a wellbeing Budget, we just had $10 million only put towards Pharmac.
Mr Elliott called for the de-politicisation of Pharmac through "cross-party agreement."
"The fact is that we are in a situation which is a crisis. We need to get funding, and whether it's a Labour-led coalition or whether it's National, the promises that are made there as well. We just need to increase the funding.
"We were happy the fact that National actually announced that at the conference – the $200 million increase … but the most important thing is we actually need this increase in funding, full stop, and I think it’s the most important thing we can keep fighting as New Zealanders for a long time."
He said Kadcyla has greatly improved Tracey's quality of life.
"It has halved [Tracey’s] cancer counts, dramatically reduced the size of her tumour – it's given her a situation where she looks forward to getting up out of bed every day and continue living.
"What proof do you need? So that's why we're ecstatic that it's finally been listened to."
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