Kate Green of RNZ
A petition asking for cancer drug Keytruda to be funded for early-stage breast cancer has received more than 17,000 signatures.
A group of survivors, those currently in treatment, and supporters gathered on the steps of Parliament this morning to meet MPs and call for change.
Catherine Cooke, the author of the petition, said in total it had received 17,096 signatures.
As well as feeling gratitude for her own remission, she said she carried the guilt of surviving while others did not get access to the same treatment.
But even though she had qualified for access, her treatment had not been funded. Cooke said she had suffered a $750,000 loss when she sold her business to pay for Keytruda.
Currently, the drug – also known as pembrolizumab – is funded for late-stage cancer diagnoses, meaning people in the early stages are missing out, or forking out tens of thousands of dollars.
Triple negative breast cancer is a sub-type of breast cancer which lacks the receptors for hormones or HER2 protein found in other breast cancers, affecting about 10% of New Zealand woman diagnosed.
It is more common in younger women – that is, under the age of 44 – and tends to be more aggressive than other sub-types.
The drug is funded for early-stage triple negative breast cancer in more than 40 countries, including Australia, the United Kingdom and Canada.
Cooke’s petition asks to expand the eligibility criteria to those with an early diagnosis, which she said would be a more effective treatment and save the health system money in the long term.
It is currently on Pharmac’s options for investment list, which contains more than 100 drugs the government’s drug buying agency would like to fund if it had the money available.
“There’s no winners,” Cooke said. “I mean, yes, I’m alive and I’m grateful. I’m grateful for the people that supported me, but at the end of the day, equity must be for everybody and not just for those that can’t afford to crowdfund or can’t afford it.”
Among those who had come to Wellington to support the petition, Annette Wikeepa and Angela Davies knew better than most the difference funded treatment could make.
Back in 2007, Wikeepa was among a group who took a case to the High Court to get Herceptin funded for HER2-positive breast cancer, helping about 600 women each year.
Davies was one of them, diagnosed at the age of 47 in 2023. She received a year of chemotherapy and Herceptin, followed by a year on Kadcyla.
Because of Wikeepa’s work, funding the treatment was “one thing I didn’t have to worry about”, she said.
“Knowing that Annette was here today, I had to come.”
Davies was 48 at diagnosis – now, she is nearing 70. She paid $80,000 for her treatment and then raised $100,000 to take a case to court almost 20 years ago.
Davies was very grateful for that work.
“If it had have been a conversation about finances, I certainly wouldn’t have been able to complete my treatment. It just wouldn’t have been possible.”
Cooke is set to present her petition to the Health Select Committee at Parliament tomorrow.
Todd Stephenson, ACT’s health spokesperson, told RNZ he had been following Cooke’s campaign for several months, calling her a “fierce advocate”.
His party had been very supportive of reforms at Pharmac to change the culture and the way it approaches funding decisions, he said, but acknowledged there was “more work to be done there”.
Work was under way to improve Pharmac’s ability to advocate and better improve its budget bids.
“We would like all New Zealanders to get access to the gold standard treatments that are available to other people across the world,” he said.
