Montana’s $12,500 fast track for unproven drugs is now open for business

If you’ve got a biotech startup, a drug that’s cleared Phase 1 safety testing in maybe a dozen people, and $12,500, Montana now has a deal for you. As of this week, companies can apply to a new state review board that can greenlight the sale of experimental treatments through dedicated clinics—the first expected by year’s end. It’s the sharpest edge yet of the right-to-try movement, and it’s explicitly open to anyone who can pay and sign a consent form.

For Kris DeVault, it can’t come fast enough. His infant son Brody has creatine transporter deficiency, a rare disorder starving his brain and muscles of energy. There’s no cure, but a company has a drug in early testing—animal studies, a few healthy adults. DeVault knows it’s a long shot. He’s pushing anyway, because the standard pathway offers his son nothing. That desperation is the emotional core driving Montana’s experiment.

The law is tailor-made to thrill the longevity crowd and biotech libertarians who see the FDA as a bottleneck. But critics see a dangerous bypass of the systems that prove drugs actually work and are safe. The cost and consent framework effectively creates a two-tier market: access for those with resources, hope for everyone else. Whether the review board becomes a rubber stamp or a genuine gatekeeper is the open question.

Jessica Hamzelou’s reporting doesn’t pretend to have the answer—it just lays out the stakes. A state is building the infrastructure for a parallel drug market right now. The clinics are coming. The applications are open. The tension between desperate families and the precautionary principle isn’t theoretical anymore. It has a price tag, and it’s twelve thousand five hundred dollars.