Public Liothyronine (T3) UK looking like some good news

Competition and Markets Authority has provisionally found that the NHS has been massively, massively overcharged for T3
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/...of-abusing-its-position-to-overcharge-the-nhs

 

I saw this news earlier today. But I doubt it will make much difference to patients. NHS England is in the process of banning T3. Most, if not all, CCGs have already banned it anyway. Concordia is going bankrupt, so the NHS won't be able to get its money back. I imagine the profits they generated will have been regularly salted away in tax havens, and will have been for years. Concordia doesn't conduct research, or manufacture anything, they buy generics from other companies, so there will be few assets, if any, to grab.

There are people all over England with known underactive thyroid who can't convert T4 to T3 very well having their T3 taken off them, and usually it is because their TSH is low, and patients galore are being shouted at and accused of abusing their medication. This is all being done to hide the fact that T3 is being removed for cost reasons. Doctors don't want to admit this, so they blame the patients and accuse them of lying if they can.

The stupid thing is that patients have been alerting the CMA, the NHS, the Department of Health, and Jeremy Hunt or his predecessors to the unjustified rise in cost of T3 for years, and all these warnings were waved away for stupid reasons, or the letters were being ignored. Nobody in government can say that they weren't warned.

 

Well the warnings haven’t entirely been waved away, otherwise the CMA wouldn’t have found as it did.

The sole reason that the NHS is in the process of banning T3 is the cost. If it was as cheap as levothyroxine they wouldn’t have a problem with it. The NHS can say of any drug that the benefits don’t justify the cost- if the cost comes down the equation evens up.

So this is good news, and I’m enjoying hearing some!

 

and in 5 to 10 years the NHS may start prescribing it again, after NICE has done a fresh review on cost/benefit

Yes it's good news, but I'm not sure how many actual patients it will help.



(sorry - can't find a party emoji for you)

 

That's true. But they could have avoided probably 5 or more years of heavy costs, and stopped torturing (or never started torturing) so many thyroid patients if they'd paid attention to patients' warnings. It's too late now for most people who were prescribed it though. Very few patients still get T3 because of the bans on prescribing it.

But I'm glad the CMA have finally pulled their finger out. They still have to confirm the finding though. Fingers crossed!

 

Yes I do agree. I’m one of the lucky ones who is still prescribed it, although I expect it to stop at any time. It’s made a real difference to my stamina and level of functioning.

I’ll join you with the fingers crossed

 

And it was ever thus with the NHS and Social Care in this country. Everything moves so slowly and by the time things change other things have overtaken them in terms of need.

But yes celebratory emojis all round