• Should young people be able to jump queues for costly drugs at the expense of older people who've already had a long life?
• Are poor people more deserving of help than rich people"?

The proposals are among a raft of provocative questions being asked by Pharmac as it conducts a consultation exercise about the criteria it uses when deciding how to spend its budget, which last year was $783 million.

Other questions being posed are:

• Should the underprivileged groups such as Maori and Pasifika get priority access to drugs?
• Should it take into account the ability of parents of sick children to return to work?
• Should it assess the future earning potential of children?
• Should it have different priorities for providing treatment of conditions considered "preventable", compared to those that are genetically based?

Source

• Stuff.co.nz
• Image: Hacklive.ru