New Drugs, Old Drugs, Openness and Cost Implications

The efficacy of magic or not-so-magic cures – particularly new ones and their costs -- came under scrutiny in a recent article in the Wall Street Journal called "The War on (Expensive) Drugs."

The opinion piece has relevance to California's grand experiment in scientific research with its promise of finding cures through embryonic stem cells. The expected costs of those cures, funded in part – perhaps a crucial part – by California taxpayers, have already generated concerns that they will not be available to many Californians.

Scott Gottlieb, physician and fellow at the American Enterprise Institute as well as a former senior official at the FDA and Medicare, wrote the WSJ article, which focuses on a Congressional proposal "to spend more than $300 million to establish a new federal 'Center for Comparative Effectiveness' to conduct government-run studies of the economic considerations that go into drug choices."

Gottlieb is critical of the processes involved in what he says are politically popular studies "that pit expensive new medicines against older, cheaper alternatives with the aim of cutting health-care spending."

But he also shines some light on the lack of transparency in science and medicine as well as methodologies that seem to be driven by desires for a certain result.

Gottlieb deals with three well-known studies that have been subject to considerable attention: The $725 million Women's Health Initiative, the $135 million Antihypertensive and Lipid-Lowering Treatment to Prevent Heart Attack Trial (Allhat)and the $40 million Clinical Antipsychotic Trials in Intervention Effectiveness (Catie) trial.

Gottlieb wrote:

"Like the Women's Health Initiative, bottom-line data from Allhat and Catie were subject to parochial secrecy. Catie's complete safety data are only being released this September, almost four years after the study was completed. Moreover, the drugs involved in these studies were for conditions where one expects a great deal of individual variation in how people might respond. The studies didn't take measure of that.

"Now the government is sponsoring a poorly designed trial to test whether Avastin, a drug that is meant for injection into the veins to treat cancer, can also -- when injected directly into the eye -- treat macular degeneration, a leading cause of blindness. Never mind that Avastin's manufacturer, Genentech, developed a completely new drug called Lucentis, which is specifically designed to be injected into the eye and is better adapted to treat blindness.

"Since a single cancer infusion of Avastin contains a large volume of the drug, breaking that same dose down into the small aliquots needed for the eye injections is literally pennies on the dollar, making the government's study of it -- when it was clearly not designed for eye treatments -- a matter of cost containment. Surely if Avastin ends up harming those eyes -- a plausible consequence of this off-label, if not illegally 'compounded' use -- it won't be Uncle Sam on the hook with product liability lawyers, but Genentech.

"Not all government-funded studies have speckled histories. Many uncover significant advances. Problems arise when the government pursues studies to achieve its own economic goals, where political motivations seem to intrude on the design and conduct of the trials and bias not only how results are interpreted, but more especially, how they are reported."

Some readers wrote to the WSJ concerning Gottlieb's piece, including Bryan R. Luce and Dennis A. Revicki, both senior vice presidents at United BioSource in Maryland. They said,

"It seems to us, the solution is clear. Government-funded research and interpretation need to be fully open for critical peer review by independent and stakeholder experts from any sector (including manufacturers) at all stages of the process. Similarly, funded research by private industry would be well advised to follow suit. Then, perhaps, we would have less rancor and better supportable scientific evidence for informing clinical and public policy and the health and well being of the public would be better served."

Gottlieb is dubious of some government-funded studies. Others are equally dubious of business-funded studies that seem to overlook results that are not favorable to introduction of a new product. Meanwhile astronomical prices are charged patients to recoup drug development costs. Increasingly this mulligan stew of medicine and science and business is leaving few satisfied. Even fewer will be satisfied if the $3 billion ($6 billion including interest) investment by California taxpayers results in therapies that are out of the reach of millions who need them.