Well, give the same medicine!

Charity funds turned to the president for drugs for cancer patients

The Constantine Khabensky charity foundation, together with the Funds “Give Life”, “Advita”, the organization “Anbi” and other patients and parental communities and organizations on October 26, published an open letter that refers to the monstrous deficiency of 26 antitumor drugs. Among them are Winkristin, Etoposid, Daunorubicin, Mitoxantron, Idarubicin, Metrectorsat, Citarabin, Karboplatin. These medicines are a chance for children and adults.

In 2020, the production of many drugs in Russia decreased sharply. In addition to this, more than 100 batches of antitumor drugs were withdrawn - impurities were found in them. Because of this, a deficit formed.

Not expensive, but basic drugs disappeared. They are inexpensive, but form the basis of therapy, for many years they are effectively used by doctors and allow patients to recover.

The medical community had previously tried to draw attention to the deficit. At a meeting of children's oncologists in January 2020, it was noted that the deterioration in the quality and accessibility of drugs has now led to a decrease in patient survival: the frequency of relapses in acute lymphoblastic leukemia (this is the most frequent cancer in children) increased from 4 to 15%. About 100 children who could be cured per year. In February 2020, 142 Russian children's oncologist signed a letter to the Ministry of Health, in request to establish the purchase of quality drugs.

The "new" also versed in a similar situation that has prevailed with medicines against rare genetic diseases. The reason is the same: illiterate regulation of the Russian pharmaceutical market, artificial pricing, dishonest state tenders. This led to a partial or complete lered from the Russian market of many domestic and foreign drugs that have no high -quality analogues. Their deficiency is not compensated by new drugs.

The full text of the open letter can be read here.

Konstantin Khabensky

Actor, founder of the fund

It is impossible that in such a large and strong country as ours, children who can be cured, die from a lack of drugs. We adults cannot afford to let our children like that. We cannot sit back, observing how the day after the day of the drugs is less and less, and more desperate parents who lose hope are more and more. This is serious, this is an alarm. That is why my colleagues from other funds decided to openly speak and ask for help, real assistance to hundreds of thousands of people who need urgent treatment.