Advocate pushes for catastrophic drug plan in N.B.
Published Saturday March 13th, 2010
BRUCE BARTLETT
Telegraph-Journal

http://telegraphjournal.canadaeast.com/front/article/982985

SAINT JOHN - Terry Crowe is a small-business owner who suffers from ankylosing spondylitis, a chronic, inflammatory arthritis and autoimmune disease that has caused his spine to curve.

Terry Crowe says the meeting he organized and drew about 40 people Thursday was ‘a good point to grow from.’

The only drug that stops it from getting worse is Remicade, an infusion taken every six weeks at a cost of $2,300 per treatment.

New Brunswick is one of only two provinces in the country without a catastrophic drug plan covering those who don't have some other form of drug insurance, but who need expensive prescriptions, Crowe said. He organized a meeting at UNBSJ this week that drew about 40 people on a Thursday night.

"I thinks we made an impact here, it was a good point to grow from," he said.

He has spoken to Health Minister Mary Schryer, who said the provincial government is looking to do something as part of the anit-poverty initiative.

Crowe says people on social assistance already have access to health cards for drugs, but what is needed is something for those who end up on expansive therapies that drive them into poverty,

For several years Crowe was prescribed anti-inflammatory drugs he could afford that helped his condition, but it turns out they were destroying his stomach.

"I was told that if I continued taking them, I could have a bleed out and die," he said.

Three years ago his doctor put him on Remicade, a treatment that stops his body from over producing a protein that damages his joints.

At that time Crowe, with his doctor's help, managed to get a drug card from the province, even though he was not on social assistance. Each year he had to reapply and recently he was told he couldn't have the card because his small business, Jiffy shoe repair at the Millidgeville Superstore, employs one other person and he has some savings.

"They told us to take a trip, spend it on the house and then come back to see them," Crowe said.

He is not the only one in this Catch-22 situation of having what the government considers to be too many assets to be eligible for help, but not enough to be able to afford the expensive drug therapies they need to stay healthy.

Linda Wilhelm of Fredericton also spoke to the meeting about the lack of action by successive governments over the past 10 years on catastrophic drug coverage.

She became a patient advocate after she was immobilized by a form of arthritis in 1998 that would only respond to a drug approved elsewhere in the world, but not Canada.

"It took 763 days to get the drug I needed approved," she said.

She has a health plan to cover the cost, which is about $1,500 a month. Without the drug she believes she would be in long-term care at much greater cost.

Since then she has helped a number of people in similar situations. They were prescribed drug therapies that were pushing them into poverty but were told by officials to spend all their money first and then they could get help.

"What this province is doing is just unconscionable," she said. "Every other province is this country has catastrophic drug coverage except for P.E.I. and here."

"If every other province can afford to do this then New Brunswick can afford it too," Wilhem said.