Steve Georganas (Adelaide, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Ensuring Australians have access to affordable medicines is absolutely essential. I'd like to start off by thanking the minister for health, Mark Butler, for ensuring mechanisms such as the PBS are maintained and improved, and we have seen a lot of improvement in the last 10 months. The PBS is an essential element to Australia, providing a system for the government to subsidise the cost of medications for the treatment of Australian patients. It is a Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme that truly does benefit all Australians. Just in my electorate of Adelaide over $300,000 was saved on PBS medications by constituents in January and February this year alone by the new prices that came out. The PBS was put in place to not only enhance the quality of life but also provide access to important life-saving medication. Unfortunately, not all medication is listed on the PBS. The decision for example, by Novo Nordisk to withdraw Fiasp from the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme is deeply distressing for Australians living with type 1 diabetes and their families, and this is a prime example of how lack of access to medication can be so detrimental. Many people come to see me seeking assistance and help, as I'm sure all members of this place see people wanting assistance and help. These people need life-saving medication and cannot get access, due to significant cost.

I've recently been assisting a constituent of mine who came to our office with no viable option to have access to necessary treatment. She's been fighting breast cancer for seven years. The medication Tukysa was recommended by an oncologist to my constituent as her last option. The medication is registered by the TGA. This medication has been proven and recognised to help, so we wrote to the ministers for health, both the state minister and the federal minister, and we're grateful for the advice they gave us and that we received. Through that advice we wrote to the pharmaceutical company to request the medication be provided to this constituent on compassionate grounds, and I must say they did provide it on compassionate grounds. We assisted the constituent with her personal letters to the company, as well as support letters from my office. After a lot of correspondence to and from and a lot of concern, this constituent has been offered six months access to the medication, with a potential cost-sharing scheme at the end—an offer that is still not ideal, due to the unknown financial liability. She has informed my office she'll be taking the offer up, and rightly so. We've made sure she knows we'll continue for fight for her. We'll continue to do whatever we can, and we are continuing to liaise with the ministers for health both state and federal.

Another constituent had mantle cell lymphoma. He needed CAR T-cell therapy, which was available only in Melbourne, not in South Australia. My constituent was not medically able to travel, and his window of opportunity was very limited. Like many, the medication was registered by the TGA and received highly positive recommendations by the Medical Services Advisory Committee. He was an eligible candidate for the treatment, yet he was not able to access it. This was the last hope to fight for survival, and we spent weeks corresponding trying to get answers and results. Whilst we were eventually successful in assisting this constituent with access to the treatment, by the time this happened he sadly passed away. This was another long fight for a life-saving medication.

These patients simply do not have time to waste. As we know, there is unfortunately much uncertainty in the life of a patient with cancer—or any life-threatening disease, for that matter. We know these patients already fight hard enough as it is. Having to also fight to access a life-saving medication is a huge additional and unknown burden to bear for these people. There needs to be a mechanism to ensure these people are protected and looked after. It is so sad for these patients when perhaps there are medicines that can help—and, in this case, in both circumstances there were medicines and are medicines that can help—or, for example, when a medication has been directly recommended to them but the patient cannot have access to the medication, as it is not seen to be cost effective. We're putting cost effectiveness in front of people's lives. These medications, all of the ones I've dealt with, are backed by scientific trials and registered by the TGA. (Time expired)

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