THE long-awaited new Hepatitis C drug will be available on Spain’s national health system shortly, but only for certain patients.
According to Dr María Londoño from the Hospital Clínic in Barcelona, a member of the Spanish Agency for Medication and Healthcare Products, the drug Sovaldi will be administered to sufferers awaiting a liver transplant or who have undergone one, those with liver cirrhosis, or who have found more traditional treatment to have been ineffective.
Those with minor fibrosis – which accounts for the majority of Hepatitis C sufferers – will not be given the new drug.
“They will not be left untreated – they will be given other types of medication – but this is just a way of establishing which patients have the most urgent needs,” explains Dr Londoño.
Sovaldi is currently being given to patients with the most advanced conditions subject to authorisation from the Agency.
Spain’s health authority spent some months negotiating the price of Sovaldi, since the drug company manufacturing it wanted to charge prohibitive amounts for it which would mean huge restrictions on its administration.
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