Why must patients pay the price to beat cancer?

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Cancer patients have to pay for prescriptions vital to their treatment. Heather Monteverde from Macmillan Cancer Support explains why the system is in urgent need of an overhaul

Thursday, May 15, 2008

How much does cancer cost? It's a shocking question, but one which thousands of people who have been diagnosed with the illness are being forced to address.

Macmillan research has shown that financial concerns are affecting three quarters of cancer patients in Northern Ireland.

The actual cost of having cancer can run into tens of thousands of pounds, so it's no wonder that many cancer patients claim that money worries are second only to pain as a cause of stress; some even say financial concerns are greater.

Macmillan provides support to people affected by cancer through our welfare benefits services and through the provision of Macmillan grants.

A cancer diagnosis can bring with it many extra costs such as increased fuel bills, new clothes, travelling to and from hospital and additional childcare. This is at a time when 90% of people report a drop in income.

Paying for prescription charges on top of these extra costs can be the last straw for some. People with cancer across Northern Ireland are having to bear the financial burden of prescription costs for essential medicines both to treat their illness and side-effects.

The toxicity of cancer treatment such as chemotherapy means that cancer patients are often given multiple prescriptions for drugs to control symptoms such as sickness, mouth ulcers and diarrhoea.

Yet we hear stories from pharmacists about people asking them which of their prescriptions is the most important, as they can't afford them all, or from cancer patients themselves about frequently going without their medication because they just didn't have the money to pay for it. The Macmillan Cancer Support 2006 patient survey found that one in 10 cancer patients who pay charges are unable to pay for their prescriptions.

And the changing nature of cancer treatment means that this situation will only get worse.

More and more people are now receiving their cancer treatment as an out-patient.

There are already chemotherapies which can be taken as an oral treatment and the number of these life-saving drugs is likely to grow dramatically over the next decade.

Great news, obviously, for patients. But the hidden side to this is that as an out-patient, you are no longer eligible for free prescriptions.

It is overwhelmingly accepted that the current prescription charging system is manifestly unfair.

Several conditions are exempt, including for instance diabetes, but not cancer, which means that a cancer patient who has diabetes will get all their prescriptions for free, whereas a cancer patient who does not will have to pay.

Macmillan Cancer Support believes that Northern Ireland should not be the kind of country where people with cancer have to choose between vital prescriptions to alleviate the effects of chemotherapy, nor should we be the kind of country that asks people to pay for NHS drugs that will save their life.

It is time for the Health Minister, Michael McGimpsey, to bring an end to this stealth tax on illness and abolish prescription charges for cancer patients — it's time to change the charges.

For confidential financial advice and support, or to find out more about Macmillan Grants, please call the Macmillan Benefits Helpline on 0808 801 0304 or go to www.macmillan.org.uk