Installation features 'forbidden' medicines denied to New Zealanders
Patient advocacy groups in New Zealand are hosting an art installation called the 'Forbidden Pharmacy' to highlight the lack of government funding for essential medicines. The exhibit features locked medicine cabinets to represent treatments that patients are forced to pay for out-of-pocket or travel abroad to access.
Why it matters
It highlights the growing tension between public healthcare funding models and the financial burden placed on patients with terminal illnesses.
Patients waiting for life-changing medicines to be funded say people should not have to fundraise, go into debt, or travel overseas for treatments and therapies that could be administered here.
More than a dozen patient organisations are hosting the Forbidden Pharmacy, online, and this weekend at Auckland's Shed 10.
It's an installation that shows shelves of white medicine packets and bottles locked behind doors - representing what people may need but can't access, because they are not funded by Pharmac.
When Jemma Gerring was diagnosed with stage four bowel cancer in late 2023 she had no symptoms till the day she went to the doctor thinking she might have appendicitis.
"It was surreal. It was just like being hit by a freight train. It took a long time to process what that meant," she said.
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