£50m government fund for access to new cancer drugs

29.07.10 Britain's coalition government plans to boost the sale and use of innovative cancer drugs in the British Health system. Health Secretary Andrew Lansley said that, starting in October, an extra £50 million will be available cancer sufferers who have been denied drugs on the NHS because they are too expensive. The money will cover the period until April 2011, when a national Cancer Drugs Fund is to be installed.
The announcement of the fund came as the Government published a report showing that NHS patients were given fewer medicines than people in America, Switzerland, Spain, France, Denmark, Canada and Australia and that British cancer patients were particularly disadvantaged in access to new drugs compared to sufferers in other developed countries.
In the UK the NHS rationing body, the National Institute for health and Clinical Excellence (NICE), postulates which drugs are paid for, based on the price and the effectiveness of the drug. The panels of the Cancer Drug Fund will be able to approve the drugs if they believe patients will gain clinical benefit, overruling Nice. Paul Burstow, care minister, denied this meant the fund would undermine Nice and said it was about providing additional funding for drugs that might give patients 'precious extra weeks and months with loved ones'.
In the longer term the government aims to switch to 'value-based' pricing for drugs so the amount paid by the NHS reflects more closely, the actual value of the drug to patients.