Cancer is the leading cause of death in Singapore today and treatment can be very expensive.
In Sep 2022, the Cancer Drug List (CDL) was introduced and only included only treatments that are both clinically proven and more cost-effective. This has helped to stem the escalating cost of cancer treatments in the public health sector as drug companies are willing to offer lower prices to keep their drugs on the list.
This also helped to put a downward pressure on drug costs in private healthcare, all in line with the bigger premises of managing and keeping healthcare costs affordable, which touches on the important issue of balancing societal controls vs individual needs.
In view of this, we are delighted to share a visual explainer contributed by Prof Hsu Li Yang, Dr Ravindran Kanesvaran from the National Cancer Centre Singapore, cartoonist Sonny Liew, and Straits Times senior health correspondent Salma Khalik to shed light on the rationale behind the MOH Cancer Drug List.