Father who lost loved ones in Surfside collapse sues insurance company amid cancer battle – NBC 6 South Florida

The Langesfeld family has been at the forefront of the effort to build a memorial to the Surfside building collapse victims. Now they’re fighting a different battle, this time against an insurance company. 

Pablo Langesfeld lost his daughter and son-in-law when the Champlain Towers building collapsed in 2021. Now he’s suffering another type of pain, stage four pancreatic cancer, and he’s suing the Oscar Insurance Company. 

“His doctor says he needs it, insurance company says we’re not covering it,” said Langesfeld’s son, Martin Langesfeld. 

The issue is an anti-cancer combination drug therapy called Avmapki Fakzynja, which costs $48,500 every three weeks. 

“He’s going through very intense chemotherapy every week, and this medication goes hand in hand with that chemotherapy to complete the treatment that his doctor, his oncologist, is recommending. We don’t know long he will live, but if his doctor recommends it, it’s for a reason,” Martin Langesfeld said.

The drug combination is approved by the FDA for the treatment of ovarian cancer, but is not yet approved for pancreatic cancer. It has shown promising results in trials, and some insurance companies do cover it. 

“This is a much bigger issue; this isn’t just one patient, this is the industry in general,” Martin Langesfeld said. “I can assure you, many of the people behind this camera can relate to denials and headaches.”

The trial started Monday in a Miami civil courtroom. Lawyers representing Oscar would not talk to NBC6 on camera, but in the court filings, they say the drug therapy was denied because it’s not part of Langesfeld’s policy, it’s not the standard of care for pancreatic cancer, and it’s still not approved for that disease by the FDA, among other reasons. 

The Langesfeld family, meanwhile, is dealing with another crisis. 

“It’s really hard to put into words after what we went through in Surfside, which was losing my sister to a building collapse and her husband, to here, standing in a court once again, not for construction defects and corruption but for health care denials,” Martin Langesfeld said.