15 Apr, 14 | by BMJ
Picture the scenario: a disease is destroying your liver and there’s a chance you will die. There’s a cure, but you can’t have it as it costs more than you earn. There are tens of millions more of people like you. Hundreds of thousands of them die every year.
It sounds like some sci-fi dystopia, but this is the situation that the 150 million people who have hepatitis C virus (HCV) find themselves in today. HCV is spread through blood-to-blood contact, mostly through shared needles. Around 350,000 people die of HCV related liver complaints each year, but new drugs have been developed within the last six months with cure rates higher than 90 per cent.
Big pharmaceutical companies such as Gilead are pricing it up to $84,000 (£50,000)—that’s $1000 (£600) a pill.....Continue reading....
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