Bringing down the cost of healthcare coverage
降低醫保成本任重道遠

Chinese patients, their relatives, and doctors have been calling for the inclusion of Gleevec and other live-saving drugs in the national public health insurance. But it's not easy. The national healthcare drug list hasn't been changed for five years. But at the local level, there are already a handful of breakthroughs.

Several provinces, including Guangdong, Fujian, Shandong and Jiangsu, have started to include Gleevec in their public healthcare coverage. In Jiangsu, the provincial government, the pharmaceutical companies and the patient share the costs of a number of expensive drugs that have been proven to be effective for some critical illnesses. Once the province adopts the drug, patients pay less than a third of its overall cost.

Novartis has also launched discount programs. Eligible patients in areas where certain drugs are not covered by public healthcare can buy three months' worth of medicine and get nine months' free. //And most recently, Sichuan Province has announced that starting from next month, CML will be included in its healthcare system. Gleevec and other treatments will be covered up to 75 percent.