Vancouver Man Pays $90,000 a Month for U.S.-Approved Pancreatic Cancer Drug Unavailable in Canada
James Howard, a Vancouver resident with Stage 4 pancreatic cancer, is spending roughly $90,000 CAD monthly on daraxonrasib, a drug approved by the U.S. FDA but not yet available or funded in Canada. While clinical trials show the treatment significantly extends survival, Canadian oncologists warn that soaring drug prices are harming patients and health systems.
James Howard, a Vancouver resident diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in November 2025, has seen his disease metastasize to Stage 4. To access a newly approved treatment, he is paying approximately $63,000 US—roughly $90,000 CAD—per month out of pocket.
The drug, daraxonrasib, was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in August. It is manufactured by Revolution Medicines, based in Redwood City, California, which set the launch price at $480,000 US annually, or $40,000 for a 30-day supply at wholesale cost. The company has not yet applied for approval from Health Canada, meaning the medication is neither authorized nor publicly funded in the country.
Clinical trials demonstrated that daraxonrasib halted or reversed tumor progression in nearly a third of patients, compared to about 10 percent for standard chemotherapy. The treatment increased survival from less than seven months to roughly 13 months.
Despite these outcomes, the financial burden places immense pressure on patients and the public health-care system. Doctors report that patients have broken down crying because they cannot access necessary treatments, describing the cost of life-saving drugs as crippling for many Canadians who face financial ruin or must choose between paying enormous sums and going without life-extending medication.
Dr. Christopher Booth, an oncologist affiliated with Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, noted that U.S. drug pricing occurs in an ecosystem that essentially forbids government negotiation on new drug launches. In contrast, Canadian authorities work directly with pharmaceutical companies to determine prices. This structural difference contributes to high costs south of the border; last year, the median net price for new drugs launched in the U.S. exceeded $250,000 US, representing an increase of more than 35 percent from three years earlier.
In Canada, sales of patented drugs reached $22.1 billion in 2024, an 11 percent increase that accounted for 47 percent of all spending on medicines. That year, 1,137 patented medicines were approved in the country. Organizations such as the Patented Medicine Prices Review Board (PMPRB), the Institute for Clinical and Economic Review (ICER), CancerCare Manitoba, and researchers from McGill University in Montreal continue to monitor the growing strain that high drug costs place on both patients and health systems.