This article gives just a little a taste of what Obamacare will be like. Scarcity is a part of any economy. But when the level of scarcity depends upon the efficiency of the government, suffering follows.  Here is the conclusion of the WSJ commentary quoted in the article:

“One depressing implication is what the decision says about health-care financing as government entitlements expand. Avastin is a political target because of its high cost – a  typical course runs as high as $88,000 – and after ObamaCare all medical questions are inevitably political questions too. In September, the FDA and Medicare proposed a “parallel review” process that will allow the two agencies to coordinate market and reimbursement approval. Medicare is also increasingly opening “national coverage determination” reviews that allow a government board to decide if a therapy is “reasonable and necessary.”

Another danger is to the future of medical innovation. Cancer treatment advances incrementally. Every year doctors are better able to pair medicines with the biomarkers pointing to the individuals who are most likely to respond and learn more about tumor angiogenesis, which is the process of cancer growth that Avastin helps to choke off. The FDA’s assault will make it harder to conduct and enroll patients in further clinical studies, to say nothing of its message about the regulatory risk for drugs still in development.

The greatest tragedy will fall on the women who are suffering from an incurable disease and whose caregivers are trying to improve their quality of life in the months they have left. The FDA is taking away one of their only options.”