State lawmakers are trying to put the finishing touches on a new law that could restore a flicker of hope for terminally-ill Missourians.
House and Senate negotiators want to let terminally-ill cancer patients get prescriptions for drugs that are still going through FDA investigational trials. The bill would let pharmacists fill those prescriptions although the medicine has not yet been approved by the Food and Drug Administration. “This bill would really help a lot of people who have no hope otherwise,” says St. Joseph Senator Rob Schaaf, a medical doctor.
Schaaf has added people with irreversible debilitating disease to those who could take part in the program.
The bill is intended to help people who are not part of the clinical trials get the medications being tested at a time when they have nothing to lose.
Lawmakers have until Friday evening to work out their differences.
