The New Zealand Breast Cancer Foundation is renewing calls for Pharmac to fund Keytruda for the most serious breast cancer, triple negative breast cancer.
Keytruda is funded for advanced non-small cell lung cancer and metastatic melanoma at a cost of $45million.
Pharmac is also considering applications to fund Keytruda for Hodgkin lymphoma, urothelial carcinoma and a head and neck cancer squamous cell carcinoma.
The drug buying agency says it will take applications to fund Keytruda for triple negative breast cancer to a Cancer Treatments Advisory Committee meeting in October.
But the Breast Cancer Foundation says action is needed now because the evidence for Keytruda for the triple negative cancer strain is “undisputable .. proven and effective.”
Ah-Leen Rayner, Chief Executive of the NZ Breast Cancer Foundation, argues that “normal drugs that are standard for triple negative don’t work the same way as Keytruda does.”
It’s yet to be seen, given a general election is just months away, whether Pharmac and its funding regime become a political issue.
Breast cancer patients who’ve battled the cruel triple negative strain support the Breast Cancer’s push to reignite the issue.
Watch the full story in the video above
SHARE ME