Comments on: Senator Eyes Cost Of Genentech Drugs

By: J. F. Kadlec, M.D.

J. F. Kadlec, M.D. — Tue, 13 Nov 2007 07:01:22 +0000

There is tremendous empirical evidence that Avastin does the same job for people going blind from macular degeneration as Lucentis. The only difference is that Lucentis is two thousand dollars an injection as opposed to Avastin at forty dollars.

Many thousands of people have been treated with the affordable Avastin without any more adverse effects than Lucentis, however, Genentech, the manufacturer of both drugs is trying to restrict the use by imposing onerous conditions, causing people to either come up with the large amount of money (and large amount of profit for Genentech) for Lucentis or go blind.

No…………Senator Kohl is absolutely right. He is concerned that the corporate greed of Genentech is being put ahead of letting people go blind. Let us hope he is successful in keeping Avastin available for treatment of macular degeneration, similar to the way it is utilized in the rest of the world.

By: Anon

Anon — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 18:28:11 +0000

It never seems to be brought up that Lucentis, as a Fab, doesn’t have an Fc region that can cause inflammation (unlike Avastin, which is an IgG), and that was a key *safety* feature in the design of Lucentis - as getting inflammation in the retina of an AMD patient is not going to make anything better..

By: Paul

Paul — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 17:59:11 +0000

Another one of their inconsistencies. Senators are all over the news complaining that industry drives off-label use; yet here they are doing it themselves.

Will government accept the liability if something goes wrong for a patient based on the government telling people to use an unproven drug?

By: sea

sea — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 14:16:07 +0000

Can the government really mandate an off-label use? I’m very curious to see how this ends up.

By: Paul

Paul — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 02:46:44 +0000

So what exactly is Senator Kohl suggesting? That people be treated with a drug for a condition where it has not been studied and no one has a clue whether or not it works?

They are speaking with both sides of their mouths when one day they insist on more safety studies and the other day they insist on treatment without any studies - efficacy or safety.

By: Paul

Paul — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 02:46:06 +0000

So what exactly is Senator Kohl suggesting? That people be treated with a drig for a condition where it has not been studied and no one has a clue whether or not it works?

They are speaking with both sides of their mouths when one day they insist on more safety studies and the other day they insist on treatment without any studies - efficacy or safety.