The health services basket committee has added 83 drugs to the drug basket. The cost of the additional drugs is estimated at NIS 415 million a year. The additions will come into effect in January 2009. The addition is good news for 340,000 patients who need these drugs, who until now had to bear a very high cost.
The health services basket committee had to balance their wish to add life-saving drugs for a small number of patients against adding drugs that significantly enhance quality of life for many patients. The latter class includes drugs for depression, diabetes, and asthma.
This year, the committee added to the basket Erbitux, for the treatment of bowel cancer. 325 people currently take the drug, at a cost of NIS 68 million a year. Erbitux is a supplement for another drug, which was added to the health services basket two years ago after a prolonged battle. In previous years, the committee argued that Erbitux extended patients' lives by only a few months, although there are cases in which patients' life apparently extended for longer.
Another cancer drug added to the health services basket is breast cancer treatment Faslodex, at a cost of NIS 4.7 million a year. Other new drugs include Novorapid, and insulin treatment, and HIV treatments Reyataz and Isentress.
The cabinet is expected to unanimously approve the additions to the health services basket, since the extra cost was already discussed during the budget talks last year. Minister of Health Yaakov Ben-Yezri welcomed the additions and noted that the health services basket's cost had increased by NIS 1.5 billion since 2006.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on December 21, 2008
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