The Ban on Innovative Medicines Affects Patients with Pulmonary Diseases

The ban on funding new and innovative medications will leave patients with pulmonary fibrosis without life-saving therapy, Bulgaria’s national consultant on pulmology Professor Kosta Kostov said on 14^th of December. He explained that the disease is rare and affects people over 60 years of age. There are no accurate statistics on the number of patients in Bulgaria suffering from the disease, but according to prof. Kostov the diagnosed are less than 100 people.

Kostov said that pulmonary involves gradual exchange of the lungs’ tissue that takes in oxygen with non-functional tissue, so the patients have serious shortness of breath. The disease is incurable, but there are new medications that slow down its progress and prolong the lives of patients. However, the Health Fund does not yet finance them, Kostov explained. According to him, they have no substitute and should have been available to us from next year, but the moratorium on innvative drugs will stop the process.

Prof. Kostov said that his appeal to the institutions is to get them out of the moratorium and give such patients a chance of taking this medicine, because by the end of this moratorium, their illness will very quickly and very fatally advance.