Former minister imported vital drugs to help an ill constituent

Apr 4 2008 by Tomos Livingstone, Western Mail

A FORMER government minister has admitted being so frustrated by the high price of a life- saving drug that he imported it himself from the US for a constituent.

Nick Ainger, formerly a Wales Office Minister, said back in 1999 that a child in his constituency was being treated with the drug Epoprostenol for a heart condition, at an annual cost of £120,000.

Funding for the treatment was to be withdrawn, but the Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire MP said he was aware the drug’s price in the US was one-eighth of what the NHS was being charged by the manufacturer Glaxo- SmithKline.

He said, “I made an arrangement with the pharmacist at Withybush Hospital in my constituency, and we started to import drugs from North America at one eighth of the price that was quoted in this country.

“There is room for serious negotiation. I know that the price has come down; I do not dispute that.

“I know also that because they are ultra-orphan drugs [drugs for rare diseases], they are extremely expensive.”

Mr Ainger is campaigning for the drug licensing body Nice to reverse its position that funding for epoprostenol and other treatments for pulmonary arterial hypertension should cease for new adult patients on cost grounds.

“Patients and clinicians have reacted to the preliminary recommendations with shock and disbelief,” he said.

“Circumstances have changed since 1999-2000.

“Nevertheless, there is no question but that at the time the arrangement saved the national health service about £120,000 on that one patient, compared with the price that it would have paid the following year.

“The situation illustrates that throughout the world, different prices are charged for the same product.

“The irony was that we imported from the United States something that had been produced 250 miles away in Dartford, Kent.”

He warned, “If the drugs are withdrawn, patients will die unnecessarily.”

Newport West MP Paul Flynn said Nice should ask for an explanation for the large discrepancy in prices charged in the UK and in the United States.