Last week ASDA announced that its in-store pharmacies will sell cancer drugs, such as Sutent, Iressa and Nexavar, at a heavily discounted not-for-profit price. Several other supermarkets followed suit. Strangely, this means ASDA and others are in ‘competition’ with the NHS, or at least opposed to the workings of the NHS. This obviously has implications for the pharma industry. A logical assumption is that if patients begin to pay for their own treatment, they will have questions about the cost of the drugs, rather than the NHS footing the bill. Yet how can pharma respond to patients’ concerns given the ban on directly communicating to them about drugs at risk of being promotional?
Healthy Conversations
Compelling conversations in healthcare communications
