Tbilisi: The Minister of Health and Social Protection of Georgia, Zurab Azarashvili met with the parents of the patients suffering from Achondroplasia. Azarashvili heard the needs of parents at the meeting and presented them with information gathered from international organizations regarding the drug “Vosoritide”.
The meeting noted that due to the lack of evidence today regarding the medication, the developed countries around the world are carefully tackling this issue to maximum patient safety.
“With an unconditional guarantee, if, as of September this year, at least a few EU countries will take responsibility and finance the newly developed treatment medicine of acondroplasia from the state budget, Georgia will be one of the advanced countries in the world, which will share this responsibility and implement necessary procedures for the purchase of the drug,” – Zurab Azarashvili announced at the meeting.
The Authorization of the drug by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the European Medicines Agency (EMA) concerns the right to import and sell the drug into countries and does not mean automatically inclusion in a state program.
It was noted that the decision to include medicines in the state program, considering the practice of different countries, specialists, doctors and experts will be discussed on the basis of a joint agreement.
Zurab Azarashvili, at the meeting with the parents of patients, once again noted the readiness of the agency that children with other consequential diseases will be funded by the state both in Georgia and abroad.
Achondroplasia is a rare disease characterized by slow growth in human height and people with this disease have normal life expectancy, ordinary intelligence, despite the growth delay.
Today, in many countries of the world, the issue of funding for the height-growing drug for patients diagnosed with achondroplasia is being discussed. In some countries, consideration has been halted due to the increased risk of the medication and insufficient evidence.
Therefore, based on detailed information received from different countries from the World Health Organization, the Coordinating Council on Rare Diseases and, accordingly, the Ministry of Health, no decision has been made regarding importing the medicine.
