How much a medicine can cost?

How much a medicine can cost?

What is the most critical resource in the modern society? Money? Time? Truth? Ideas? Religion? No way! It is a health! And very interesting who much would people afford for a medicine? The max price so far is $440,000!

The business of making superexpensive treatments for superrare diseases is booming. At least a dozen drugs With wholesale costs above $200,000 are on the market right now. A sampling:

Drug: Cerezyme

Maker: Sanofi

Helps to eliminate the fatty clumps that damage the spleen, liver, lungs and bone marrow in Gaucher disease. Cerezyme can cost $300,000 per patient per year.

Drug: Elaprase

Maker: Shire

Treats Hunter syndrome, which causes flattened noses, breathing difficulty and brain damage. Two thousand patients in the world have it. Average cost: $375,000 a year.

Maker: Cinryze

Maker: ViroPharma

Prevents attacks of hereditary angioedema, a dangerous hereditary swelling of the abdomen and lips that can cause suffocation. Average cost: $417,000 a year.

Drug: Kalydeco

Maker: Vertex Pharmaceuticals

First drug to target a genetic defect at the root of the lung disease cystic fibrosis but only works in patients with a specific mutation. Annual cost: $294,000.

Drug: Elelyso

Maker: Pfizer and Protalix BIO therapeutics

New Gaucher treatment made using genetically modified plant cells. It competes with Cerezyme. Priced at a discount, it still costs hundreds of thousands of dollars a year.