Illustration of cancer screening.
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S. Pouzet / SIPA
The correlation between the price of new cancer drugs and their therapeutic benefit is "modest", and even drugs that induce little improvements in medical outcomes see their prices skyrocket, according to a study published in the
European Journal of cancer
.
"This is a burning question because the explosive increase in the price of cancer drugs is putting increasing pressure on the balance of our Social Security system and will end up threatening everyone's access to real therapeutic innovations" , explains Professor Anthony Gonçalves, head of the medical oncology department at the Paoli-Calmettes Institute (IPC) in Marseille, where the study was conducted, of which he is the co-author.
Analysis of 36 drugs
The team led by Marc Rodwin, Professor of Law at Suffolk University (United States) and resident of the Institute of Advanced Studies of Aix-Marseille University and Patricia Marino, of the IPC, analyzed over 13 years the relationship between the price of 36 anticancer drugs approved in France and their added value compared to older drugs.
The researchers used both the clinical benefit magnitude scale of the European society for medical oncology and the improvement score of the actual benefit of the Haute Autorité de Santé, widely used for drug pricing. .
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Marseilles
Drug
Price
Health
Cancer