November 8, 2010

Quote of the Day: Lucentis vs. Avastin

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I love this News of the Weird summary of this New York Times article:

Treatments for Age-Related Macular Degeneration: Lucentis ($2,000 an injection) or the equally effective Avastin (off-label: $50). Problems: (a) Lucentis thus costs Medicare (i.e., you) a bargeload of money. (b) Both drugs are made by the same company. (c) That company, somehow, for some odd reason, prefers that patients use Lucentis and therefore offers a “promotion program” (i.e., bribes) for doctors to prescribe it. (Bonus: The bribes are legal.)

Stay classy, pharmaceutical industry!

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WE'LL BE BLUNT

We need to start raising significantly more in donations from our online community of readers, especially from those who read Mother Jones regularly but have never decided to pitch in because you figured others always will. We also need long-time and new donors, everyone, to keep showing up for us.

In "It's Not a Crisis. This Is the New Normal," we explain, as matter-of-factly as we can, what exactly our finances look like, how brutal it is to sustain quality journalism right now, what makes Mother Jones different than most of the news out there, and why support from readers is the only thing that keeps us going. Despite the challenges, we're optimistic we can increase the share of online readers who decide to donate—starting with hitting an ambitious $300,000 goal in just three weeks to make sure we can finish our fiscal year break-even in the coming months.

Please learn more about how Mother Jones works and our 47-year history of doing nonprofit journalism that you don't find elsewhere—and help us do it with a donation if you can. We've already cut expenses and hitting our online goal is critical right now.

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