Thursday, September 16, 2010

The Death Panel Is About to Rule: Death for Geraldine Satossky

The government should have never gotten into the healthcare business. Under the guise of providing healthcare for those who couldn't afford it, they have expanded the concept so that under ObamaCare we will all be forced to carry health insurance---and all suffer the consequences

What's worse is that the government will oversee what the health companies are required to cover and what they are not. For example, I'm sure that the young will be wildly overcharged relative to their risk, but there is no chance that if I decided to start a health insurance company to provide healthcare for youth and charge them a rate in line with their health risk that I would be allowed to do so.

""Universal" ObamaCare is a scam that will in part force youth to pay for the healthcare of the elderly. However, the structure of healthcare with rules being set at the macro level by Obama lieutenants will distort the market and result in bureaucratic pricing. We have all heard about the $300 toilet seats purchased by the military, wait until you hear the price that will be paid for Obama bed pans.

This bureaucratic pricing and budgeting will, of course, result in expenditures far beyond what has been projected and then the cuts in healthcare will come. Indeed, it is happening now with Medicare. The early Death Panels are in session. It is highly questionable that healthcare for the poor should be handled by government, but what should be under study now is what healthcare will look like under ObamaCare. Medicare is a good preview of what is likely to be ahead.

In today's WSJ, Geraldine Satossky describes what it is like coming up against the Death Panel:
I am 67 years young and I've been battling breast cancer for 11 years. I'm alive today because of a drug called Avastin. But by Friday the FDA is expected to revoke its approval of the drug for use against breast cancer. I'm terribly frightened—and angry.

My story begins in 1999, when I lifted my arm and discovered a web of popping red veins. Doctors identified a tumor, and I was diagnosed with breast cancer. Chemotherapy worked for a bit, but then the tumor started growing again. So I had a mastectomy.

In 2002, the cancer returned—this time to my liver. That meant my cancer had metastasized. It was treatable but no longer curable.

Once again I underwent surgery, a liver resection. I was then put on the drugs Navelbine and Etoposide. At first, it seemed to work—my cancer went into remission. But three years later, the cancer came back. I now had four tumors in my liver and my outlook wasn't very good. My doctor was blunt: "You're in big trouble," he told me.

Thankfully, a clinical trial had recently started and I was selected for a combination of Xeloda and Avastin. Xeloda is a chemotherapy pill that kills cancerous cells. Avastin cuts off blood-flow to tumors. Almost immediately two of my tumors disappeared. The duel-pronged approach appeared to be working.

Nearly three-and-a-half years have passed. Today, I'm not just living life; I'm enjoying it. While I get tired more easily than I used to, I can take part in just about all normal activities. I can go out to dinner with my husband. I can visit with friends.

This could all change on Friday, when the FDA is due to rule on its advisory panel's recommendation to withdraw approval of Avastin. If the FDA does so, Medicare could stop paying for it. My doctor is hopeful that there will be an exception for people like me—perhaps I'll be grandfathered in and allowed to continue my treatment regimen.

But I don't know if that will happen, and I have to wait and see. If Avastin is withdrawn, countless women who might benefit from the drug will be denied. This is outrageous.

I don't understand the government's rationale.

The FDA says that it is considering withdrawal because Avastin doesn't show enough promise against breast cancer. I find that very hard to believe. I'm proof that Avastin works.

The FDA is also concerned that Avastin has bad side effects. This is illogical—all chemotherapy has horrible side effects, too. As does every other medicine I've tried: Tamoxifen, Taxol, Taxotere, Navelbine, Etoposide, Arimidex and Faslodex. All cancer treatments are risky, and they all come with side effects.

But the worst side effect is death, and that's guaranteed to happen when cancer isn't treated.

Some claim that the FDA's decision is about the money. It's true that Avastin is expensive, but a medicine's price tag shouldn't allow the FDA to determine whether patients live...
When ObamaCare is in full swing, these are the kinds of decisions that will be made. It will discourage further research and innovation and when the time comes for you to be treated by ObamaCare you won't even know about the advanced treatments that might have been available to you pre-Obamacare. Those treatments won't even be brought up.

18 comments:

  1. “but a medicine's price tag shouldn't allow the FDA to determine whether patients live...”

    And therein the rub lies…

    Entitlement mentality.

    Americans, particularly Americans have got to get over this idea that an individual life should be saved without thought to the expense involved. It’s pure folly to think that we can continue to throw a finite resource (money) at an infinite problem (death).

    And Wenzel, your last paragraph summary is off base. This has nothing to do with Obamacare.

    People die, dude.

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  2. Anonymous, you are both an idiot, and an amoral monster. What in the hell does FDA withdrawal of drug approval have to do with "entitlement"? You are fatuously conflating financial entitlement, which does not exist, and which is not the subject or the rationale behind the FDA's considerations, with HUMAN entitlement to medical treatment free of bureaucratic prohibition and interference, which most certainly DOES exist.

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  3. A person should be able to spend their money on whatever they like. That includes treatments to extend their life, however absurd it may be.

    Regardless, the government should not be in the insurance business. Taxes should not pay to extend peoples lives. They should use their own money or pay a real insurance company. If you want to help people, donate to charity. They are more likely to help someone anyways.

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  4. To anonymous:
    Does that mean that people with no brains like you can be put to death?

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  5. I read this article. It does not look as if the author was even suggesting that someone else pay for her treatment.

    The meat of the article was that the FDA was killing the drug because of possible expense to the Government.

    But if the FDA course is taken this in turn would make it also unavailable to those that can afford it.

    So, ObamaCare uses the FDA to cut an expensive drug. This in turn results in anyone, even those willing to foot the bill, to get treatment.

    Government at its' best ... tearing everyone down to the lowest common denominator.

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  6. The FDA is already killing us. No revelations here.

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  7. Does the drug "work?" Sounds like it does not CURE cancer, but prolongs life. I am certainly glad Ms. Satossky is enjoying life. But one must always have their papers in order for death is inevitable.

    The drug companies are doing well, though, in their attempts to defy it.

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  8. What does entitlement mentality have to do with FDA approval? Forget the idea of Medicare paying for this drug for a minute. What about a rich and successful person being able to obtain and pay for this drug without government assistance? Having the FDA withdraw approval means that this person can't get the drug either!

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  9. Where does she say that the government or taxpayer is paying for her medicine? She doesn't. And if we were ... I'd rather pay to keep her alive than to pay for illegals coming here and grabbing a welfare tit and hanging on for life popping out babies and having us pay for all of them too.

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  10. Forget the FDA - buy it online without a prescription from Thailand.

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  11. Whatever "it" is , if the FDA approves of it, that's your sign it's NOT good for you. Likewise, if the FDA makes it illegal, then you know it was good for you. Read the Codex Alimentarius bill McBama signed on June 10, 2010 while everyone was distracted by the government's latest "problem" "reaction" "solution" fiasco in the Gulf. Exectuve Order #13544. They are about to abolish our ability to obtain healthy vitamin and herbal supplements, as well as the ability to grow our own organic vegetables. Welcome to the "New World Order" of slavery to the system.

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  12. Everything happening right now seems to indicate a future where we will all have to circumvent the government in order to get anything we want.

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  13. Damn this federal government!

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  14. BAKING SODA... CHLORELLA... AND RICE EXTRACT...

    Call me in the morning...

    The drug is being revoked because it works

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  15. There is NO doubt Avastin worked for this patient.

    But the "science", like it or not, has to show Avastin works significantly better than other agents (usually not placebos in cancer but everyone understands the placebo effect).

    So we have 2 choices when drugs like Avastin have marginal benefits in LARGE studies:

    1. Allow doctors to use there best judgment and try drugs "off label". Typically, payers will pay for this.

    2. Let the govt "make decisions" based on the science.

    I have no problem with #1 but we need to QUIT COMPLAINING ABOUT COST GOING UP 10% A YEAR. YOU CANNOT HAVE IT BOTH WAYS. EITHER RATION CARE (UK MODEL) OR PAY FOR IT (US MODEL).

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  16. The FDA withdrew approval for Avastin because in trials conducted by the MANUFACTURER it didnt do anything for breast cancer patients, in fact it increased side effects.

    The FDA still approved it for colon,lung,brain cancers.

    It had nothing to do with costs at all, in fact they are saving the government money by refusing to pay for a drug that doesnt work for breast cancer patients.

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  17. One more reason the Great Human Surplus is about to get flushed down the toilet. What's the next step after a depression? It's called Die Off. Expect it coming to a city near you courtesy of the Fourth Turning. Thank you for F-ing up the world Baby Boomers.

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  18. Yes, the young will be paying excessively for Obamacare. Then, when they are in serious need, they'll be "terminated"as "useless eaters"in a healthcare program very similar to Nazi Adolf Hitler's! The whole concept is to control and eliminate people under a rubric of "affordable healthcare". The thieves looted Social Security and Medicare, and pushing a few million elderly and handicapped folks into early graves will relieve pressure to deliver those stolen funds! Entitlement? We PAID for those programs! These are revolting situations. Live free or die!

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