Today is the last class in your current four class set. We will start class with a casual conversation. Our reading this week is about no senior zones and our listening is about growth hormone. Please listen once. I have included a transcript. For grammar will practice conditional sentences.
Click HERE for the reading
ARI SHAPIRO, HOST:
Now we turn to drug shortages. They seem to be everywhere lately, affecting antibiotics, ADHD medicines and diabetes drugs used by people trying to lose weight. But for families whose children need human growth hormone, one shortage feels like it will never end. NPR pharmaceuticals correspondent Sydney Lupkin reports on the shortage of a drug called norditropin.
SYDNEY LUPKIN, BYLINE: Eddie and Harry are 4-year-old twins.
HARRY: Clink, clink, clink.
LUPKIN: They built an airplane runway out of blocks, but instead of toy planes, plastic dinosaurs were hanging out in it. Eddie needs a daily shot of norditropin, a human growth hormone made by pharmaceutical giant Novo Nordisk. He needs it because he has a rare genetic condition and needs extra growth hormone to grow. Harry, who's a head taller and doesn't share the same medical issue, waits for his playmate to return.
ED GARNETT: One, two, three, four, five, six. All right.
EDDIE: Left butt today.
GARNETT: Yep, left butt today.
LUPKIN: That day's shot went into his backside, but his parents move it around, so it never gets too painful. Eddie has no idea that his dad has spent hours on the phone trying to get him the drug, thanks to a nationwide norditropin shortage that's left parents scrambling. The shortage started around Thanksgiving and was supposed to be over by February. Then the company said it would be over by June. Now it's expected to last through the end of the year. Eddie's dad, Ed Garnett, is frustrated.
GARNETT: You know, they wrote back, you know, we've been told it's a manufacturing issue. There's nothing else we can tell you at this point. I was like, OK, that's not super helpful. And, like, especially in contrast to the first time I've spoken to them, right? They were like, here's a bear, you know, like, here's a nurse to help you. And it felt very, to me, cold and, you know, considering the relationship we've had with them for a year-and-a-half.
LUPKIN: Legally, pharmaceutical companies don't have to explain to the public why their drug is in shortage. Michael Ganio is a senior director of Pharmacy Practice and Quality with the American Society of Health System Pharmacists, which maintains a drug shortages database.
MICHAEL GANIO: Everything that we are able to access is voluntarily provided by manufacturers. So they, basically, have the ability to control what information gets out and what doesn't. What we can also do is sometimes try to put pieces of the puzzle together.
LUPKIN: For this shortage, there wasn't much information out there. Stressed parents like Eddie's started to come up with theories. A popular one is that the drug maker was diverting plastic norditropin injector pens over to its diabetes drug, ozempic, which surged in popularity as people started using it to lose weight. To help unravel it, I reached out to Yali Friedman, founder and CEO of drugpatentwatch.com.
YALI FRIEDMAN: These things are very complicated. Even if two pens look the same, it doesn't mean that they are the same. You never know what's on - what's going on, on the inside just because the shell of the pen looks the same.
LUPKIN: From what he can tell from the patents, norditropin's pens share components with other Novo Nordisk drug product pens. While he says they're probably not the same, he can't rule out that they are. Dr. Bradley Miller, a pediatric endocrinologist at the University of Minnesota Medical School, isn't Eddie's doctor, but he has plenty of patients who depend on norditropin. He, too, has heard the theory about the ozempic pen. It's clear to him that families are stressed.
BRADLEY MILLER: We've had families who have filed complaints against me, against my staff, against my hospital for not hiring additional people to help deal with the shortage.
LUPKIN: For most kids, a missed shot is a missed opportunity to grow and reach the same size as other kids their age. For some very young children, missing growth hormone can have more serious consequences, including life-threatening hypoglycemia or low blood sugar, but they're rare. A Novo Nordisk spokesperson told me parents' suspicions that norditropin and pens are being diverted to ozempic are incorrect. She also said norditropin isn't made at the same factories as the company's diabetes and weight loss drugs, and that their production hasn't affected the supply of norditropin. Novo Nordisk said unforeseen circumstances arose when it switched norditropin's production from one plant to another. But the company did not elaborate on what those circumstances were. For Eddie's dad, finding a new norditropin pen every month is stressful.
GARNETT: It's like intellectually pretty frustrating, just to not really understand why.