Nova Scotia to fund Avastin

The Nova Scotia government says it will pay for an expensive colorectal cancer drug that it has previously refused to cover.

The unexpected announcement about Avastin came Tuesday as the provincial budget was tabled.

"We wish to provide help to those Nova Scotians and their families struggling with colorectal cancer," Finance Minister Michael Baker said in a speech at the legislature.

Deputy health minister Cheryl Doiron said the decision to fund Avastin was made very recently, and strictly for compassionate reasons. She said the province had no new evidence about the drug.

Avastin extends the lives of some patients in the late stages of colorectal cancer by stopping the blood supply to cancerous tumours.

Two petitions were tabled last year in the legislature urging the province to fund the drug. One of them was started by a 71-year-old Bridgewater woman whose son paid $18,000 for nine treatments.

Jim Connors, a Dartmouth lawyer with colorectal cancer, pushed the issue until his death earlier this month.

Nova Scotia's 23-member drug therapy committee has recommended twice that Avastin be excluded from the provincial drug list, based on its cost and the potential of other drugs in early cancer stages.

Until now, the province has agreed and refused to fund Avastin, which it estimated would cost $3.6 million a year.

Quebec, Newfoundland and Labrador, and British Columbia pay for the drug.

About 700 Nova Scotians develop colorectal cancer each year, giving the province the second highest rate of the disease in the country.

The Nova Scotia government also said Tuesday it would invest $2.7 million in a new colorectal cancer screening program.