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Speaker 1: So it has gone from thirteen cancer drugs that weren't

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Speaker 1: delivered to twenty six that will be at a cost

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Speaker 1: of six hundred million dollars in total, cancer and beyond

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Speaker 1: fifty six new medicines will be funded. This is the

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Speaker 1: big announcement from the government yesterday. First drugs ready by

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Speaker 1: October November, with the rest set to be rolled out

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Speaker 1: over the next twelve months. Cancer Society Chief executive Rachel

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Speaker 1: Hart is whether it's Rachel, very good morning to you.

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Speaker 2: Good morning mate.

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Speaker 1: Was it a game changer yesterday?

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Speaker 2: Oh? Absolutely, it was a momentous day. I mean it's

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Speaker 2: it's such a big part of the medicines that we've

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Speaker 2: been waiting on. Where really relieved for those families that

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Speaker 2: have been waiting on those thirteen thirteen cancer medicines and

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Speaker 2: have thirteen more chucked in? Is great?

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Speaker 1: Has it been a roller coaster? I mean what they

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Speaker 1: promised and what they delivered, which up until yesterday was nothing.

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Speaker 1: That level of disappointment then counteracted by the joy of

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Speaker 1: what you got. Does it sort of balance it out?

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Speaker 2: I think I think there's been a lot of uncertainty. Obviously,

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Speaker 2: my concern is for the those people with cancer who

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Speaker 2: have been waiting on this announcement. It's been a hugely

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Speaker 2: stressful time for them. Of course, the uncertainty doesn't end.

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Speaker 2: Although they know now that these drugs will be funded,

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Speaker 2: they don't know when. And when you're shelling out thousands

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Speaker 2: and thousands of dollars a month, every month matters.

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Speaker 1: What struck me yesterday is the one hundred and seventy

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Speaker 1: five thousand claim the number of people that will be helped.

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Speaker 1: I mean, that's a tremendous number of people who are

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Speaker 1: reliant on farmak.

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Speaker 2: Absolutely and just to remember, this is still only our

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Speaker 2: first step. We have one hundred and forty treatments that

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Speaker 2: are on the options for investment lists, so treatments that

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Speaker 2: FARMAC has deemed as being cost effective and health effective.

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Speaker 2: And yet they're still still like, so this isn't this

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Speaker 2: isn't even halfway down that list.

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Speaker 1: When you say that, Seymour made I thought some interesting comments,

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Speaker 1: and that is that you'll never get to the bottom

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Speaker 1: of the list. No country in the world will get

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Speaker 1: to the bottom of the list. Based on the fact

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Speaker 1: that that we are in some sort of revolution at

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Speaker 1: the moment of farmac, not farmac but big farmer producing

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Speaker 1: things that you know, we're just we're just on the

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Speaker 1: precipice of something, you know, truly exciting and you can't

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Speaker 1: afford it. Is that fair or not?

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Speaker 2: I think I think every country is grappling with the

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Speaker 2: new technologies that are coming through. However, we are the

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Speaker 2: only country in the world that has a capped budget

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Speaker 2: on medicines. So for every other OECD country wants a

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Speaker 2: medicine reaches a particular threshold, and those are different in

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Speaker 2: different places, but it gets funded. So New Zealand is

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Speaker 2: quite unique in being slow to adopt technologies that we're not.

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Speaker 2: We don't even have standard of care as it would

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Speaker 2: be expected in most other OECD countries, so we still.

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Speaker 1: Have a long way to go, which brings us to

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Speaker 1: the model argument, which I suppose National would argue, this

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Speaker 1: is why we went with thirteen in the first place,

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Speaker 1: to try and get around farmac. Is farmac as a

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Speaker 1: model fit for purpose? And are we happy with it? Broadly?

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Speaker 1: Has this taughtus some sort of lesson?

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Speaker 2: I think I think this is this is a lesson. This,

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Speaker 2: This whole you know, roller coaster that we've been on

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Speaker 2: shows us that FARMAC isn't working the way we need

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Speaker 2: we need changes to the model. We need it to

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Speaker 2: be more efficient, we need it to be more transparent,

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Speaker 2: and we need a budget allocation that reflects the opportunities

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Speaker 2: that are available to us.

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Speaker 1: You can't argue with what the government's done so far

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Speaker 1: because it's one point six one point seven whatever they announced,

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Speaker 1: you know, pre budget plus this. I mean you're in

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Speaker 1: exist of two billion dollars in a country that has

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Speaker 1: no money. I mean it's not bad yet.

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Speaker 2: Oh look, we're really excited about yesterday's announcement and it

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Speaker 2: really is a game changer.

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Speaker 1: Good stuff, Rachel, good to talk to you. Appreciate it

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Speaker 1: very much. Rachel Hard, Cancer Society, Chief Executive.

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Speaker 2: For more from News Talks B listen live on air

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Speaker 2: or online, and

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