Tuesday, 2 March 2021, 9:18 am
Patient Voice Aotearoa (PVA) welcomed the Government’s
indication that it will announce a review of its drug
purchasing agency Pharmac. Since its inception, PVA has
asked for more scrutiny of a system which sees thousands of
kiwis stranded without appropriate pharmaceutical options,
or with vastly inferior treatment options, for illnesses and
conditions which are treated as a matter of course by
countries less economically able than New Zealand. The lack
of a considered or coherent medicines strategy and the
piecemeal approach to funding drugs has led to gross
inadequacies in the standard of care in Aotearoa. As many
Proposed change to reformed abortion law focuses on what is acceptable behaviour outside clinics, controlling what bystanders can say and how close they can get.