8th December
Nowadays, more than half my emails come from overseas.
The interesting thing that I have noticed is that the people from poor Eastern European countries like Romania or Serbia and people from poor South American countries like Brasil or Ecuador are in the same desperate need as the people in the USA and Italy. They have Hep C, their government will not assist with the obscene cost of the drug and they can not afford to travel to India to get it. In places like Serbia and the Ukraine their governments prohibit the importation of generic drugs. Obviously their politicians are being paid off by Big Pharma. In some countries like Romania they can import the Hep C medicines but the cost even of the generic version Harvoni represents about two or three years wages for the average person in Romania.
The same applies to Brasil. Yet people will be well and will borrow money from friends, family and even the bank to get well. I try to help in a small way by providing people the meds at cost but even that is too high a price for many. It is a sad thing and I do not know how the people who run companies like Gilead and Bristol Myers Squib can sleep at night knowing that their pricing policies are causing so much suffering, misery and death.
Still we try to help where we can and we see the results.
An email received today from Brasil:
HI Greg
You may remember me, you help me get the medicines from India, I am from Brazil and have bought the medicines with your intermediation. I have just taken the results of blood test after 30 days on treatment (SOF/RIBAV), and AST/ALT came into normal range (27/19) and the virus is not detectable any more (the last result before treatment showed 4.400.000 UI/ml). I “had” (don’t have any more) Genotype 2, and I wish I can say that I am cured in a few months.
Thank You again for your help and congratulations for your recent cure.
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So this was a story that had a happy ending.
Below is another email that I received today... a story of refusal to be beaten by disease and greed.
Please note that the AbbVie V-Pak did not work. Now if you purchased a car or a computer and it did not perform as promised you would expect the manufacturer to refund your money but if you buy a drug treatment from AbbVie and it does not work then they keep your money and wait for you to die.
Let’s face it Big Pharma is a corporate world that is populated by people who are motivated by greed and feed on human misery and suffering. They are truly the scum of the Earth and the politicians and Hep C advocacy groups who have been bought out by Big Pharma are just as reprehensible.
Hello Greg!
I read your forum about helping people to cure HepC and I must say you`re very noble person in this world.
My story is very simple I was diagnosed with HepC in 2013 (Genotype 4, no Fibrosis) and waited long time for medication and bought Viekarax (AbbVie for 32 000 EUR) and underwent Viekarax + RBV for 3 months only to get my last results to see that it did not worked our for me...
In my country 32 000 EUR is huge amount of money I borrowed money from bank for this and now I`am more or less with payments to bank with no results.
My doctor says that I must try Harvoni or some other treatment plan that contains Sofosbuvir. In my country Harvoni costs 60 000 EUR the amount of money that I can only dream...
I still have to the bank for Viekarax 8 years, it pains me a lot to understand that I have to pay for something that did not worked out...
In my country government does not pays for Hepatitis C medication only for old treatment plan (Interferon + Ribavirin) which in my case will not work out.
I read that there will be available generic Harvoni do have some solid lead to some pharmacy or place where I can buy that ?
I will manage to collect required money for generic version.
Thank you a lot!
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