Throughout the last few decades, as more and more sophisticated drugs are developed to fight cancers of all types, the prices of these drugs continue to rise. Now, specialists who are disgusted at the high cost of these medications are joining together and approaching some of the world’s leading pharmaceutical companies with an appeal that they begin to consider the patient and not the profit.

According to an article in the Boston Globe, specialists from 15 countries on five different continents decided that they must take a more active role in resisting the high prices of chemotherapy drugs and other medications to fight cancer. Many of those doctors have previously had close ties to the pharmaceutical companies, like Dr. Brian Druker, who was the main academic developer of Gleevec, a Novartis-produced drug used to treat chronic myeloid leukemia.

Last week, a commentary published online by the medical journal, Blood, declared that the prices of drugs used to treat that particular form of cancer are “astronomical, unsustainable, and perhaps even immoral”,  and though the doctors who contributed to the article focused mainly on drugs for this type of leukemia, they noted that the prices are just as bad for drugs designed to treat other kinds of cancer as well, including rare cancers like mesothelioma. Some, they say, exceed $100,000 per year. That’s a hefty price, considering many cancer patients are dealing with loss of income while they’re being treated and others may have insufficient insurance coverage.

The doctors went as far as to refer to the high cost of drugs as “profiteering”, no different than someone who raises the prices of essential goods after a natural disaster.

“Advocating for lower drug prices is a necessity to save the lives of patients’’ who cannot afford the medicines, they wrote.

The doctors hope their commentary will prompt dialogue with some of the pharmaceutical companies that are the biggest offenders.

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