It’s sick that the cost of drugs dictates who lives and who dies

The NCPE recommended that Orkambi should not be funded ‘at the submitted price’ of €160,000 per patient per year, writes Alison O’Connor

CYSTIC fibrosis sufferers must be dismayed that supply of a drug which they believe could transform their lives has been dismissed on the grounds of cost-effectiveness.

How horrible to be the ones to make that decision. That task fell to our National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics (NCPE), which decided against Orkambi, though it has been hailed as a wonder drug.